Dolomites in September

[Zona]

We are planning a 5ish week trip to the Dolomites in late August/September later this year. We don't have anything booked, but will start making reservations soon. We are interested in easy to moderate trekking, maybe staying at rifugios for part of the time. We will have a car and will probably base ourselves in Ortisei for a couple of weeks and do daytrips/drives/hikes, then go over the Passo Gardena towards the eastern areas and thinking to possibly book a rifugio for a week followed by a week in San Candido. We had looked into Cortina d'Ampezzo but the accommodations seemed overpriced compared to what we can get in other towns.

Has anyone done a long-ish trip in this region? Did you stay in one place or move around a lot from night to night? Any favorite rifugios? If anyone did a multi-day hike, did you self-book or have a tour company plan/move luggage, etc? Would love to hear people's experience with this part of Italy. Last September we spent a month in the Lake Como area (in an apartment in Menaggio and daytripping around the lake area) and absolutely loved it. Hoping to enjoy this trip just as much, although not expecting to stay in one place the whole time, since there is so much to see across a wide area. Open to any tips and advice to help in our planning. Thanks!

 

[explanade]

I've been to the Dolomites several times. Like Austria, this is one of the rainiest parts of the world. August is typically when they have the lowest rainfall.

But I've been in Val di Gardena where for 4 days it rained and often heavily.

Parking is an issue, especially in Ortisei. You will pay a lot for parking unless you find one of those vacation apartments which has parking but they're often some distance from the center so you have to walk some distance to restaurants and uphill at that.

I've stayed in Santa Cristina and Selva but not in Ortisei, which tends to be more expensive and has more difficult parking options.

I'm not a hardcore hiker and certainly not one for multi-day hikes. Main interest I have for rifugios would be for lunch near the top of a cable car, so I can't help much for those.

I've visited Cortina d'Ampezzo once and Val di Gardena at least twice. It really depends on how you arrive there.

Closest airports are Innsbruck, Verona and Venice. Val di Gardena is closest to Innsbruck and Verona and Cortina d'Ampezzo is closest to Venice.

The other thing I've found is that car rental is cheaper from Italy than Austria and it's very expensive if you pick up one country and return in another.

Like I said, I'm not a hardcore hiker so I usually go for the 1-week cards which cover unlimited rides on cable cars, like the Val di Gardena card. All the big valleys have similar deals or you can get the Super Dolomiti card which covers all the valleys but you would have to spend at least a couple of weeks to hit all of them.