Christmas mail

San Martino, November 2024

Cari amici,
Care amiche,
The season 2024 has also come to an end.
It was a very rainy and very tiring season, but thanks to you who continue to visit San Martino, the atmosphere was very cheerful and peaceful and the positive side is – this year we didn’t have to worry about the lack of water, everything has remained nice and green and Maria’s roses have recovered well from the passed two years that were clearly too dry.

November has brought us warm, sunny and beautiful days!
Here in San Martino, we have now completed the final work on the house and garden.
Buba has put the vegetable garden into hibernation so that it can awaken again in spring and provide us with its precious vegetables. Elisa is doing the final bureaucratic work and she is preparing herself to take your new reservations even during the winter and Paola is making jams for your breakfast on our terrace.

As you can see, we are finishing the season 2024 and are already thinking about the season 2025; thus we are also already organizing the exhibitions for 2025!
From May to the end of July there will be a photo exhibition by Lars Landschreiber and from August to the end of October an exhibition of drawings and paintings by Dieter Schlösser.

The Sherpabus has unfortunately announce that from 2025 he will no longer offer the transport of the luggage that is so convenient for hikers, but only taxi services. Thus, the valley is looking for someone who would like to offer this service in future. However, we would like to thank Gianni Pilotto, the operator of the Sherpabus, for the great service he has provided in the valley for over 30 years and hope that somenone will be found who can imagine living and working in the valley and offering luggage transports to the hikers.

We were just about to send you this letter when we received a very sad news.
Ursula Bauer passed away on the 16th of November 2024, at the age of 77 in her apartment in Zurich. In May, she presented the latest edition, now the 10th, of the hiking guidebook „Antipasti und alte Wege“, which she wrote 25 years ago, together with her partner Jürg Frischknecht (1947-2016) in San Martino. The Maira Valley owes a great deal to Ursula and Jürg because without this book, the Maira Valley would probably never have become so well known in German-speaking countries. Thank you Ursi and Jürg for your tireless commitment to the Maira Valley!
Despite her great success, Ursula has always remained a very modest, quiet and very lovable person, who has grown very dear to our hearts and whose annual visits and conversations in San Martino we will miss very much. This news shows us once again how important it is to enjoy every moment with the people who are close to our herats, because you never know how much time you have left together.

For today we bid you farewell and wish you a peaceful New Year.
Take good care of yourselves! We hope to see may of you again next year in San Martino.
Remember: it is our duty to be happy!
Paola & Elisa