Val Parina: the traverse from Zorzone to Scalvino on CAI trail 259

The path leaves the road on the left before you reach Zorzone, at about 850 metres, near the Serbaplast firm, and for the whole first part keeps to the orographic right side of the valley (CAI Bergamo). Soon you reach the Cappelletta di Petta, a white chapel on a rocky spur with a view over the upper valley; then you go up and down through the woods for about an hour to the meadows and farm buildings of Prà Parina, at 826 metres according to Percorsi MTB Val Brembana.

Further on the path narrows and cuts across a slope that drops sheer into the valley, crossing gravel gullies protected with chains: it is the most delicate stretch, which even the mountain-bike description advises doing on foot. You then drop to the valley floor, where the water has carved potholes and walls that almost touch.

The last stretch is almost level on the bed of the old railway, with bridges and two tunnels and a surface cluttered with stones and old rails. You reach the Bocca di Parina, the confluence with the Brembo at the place the CAI calls La Goggia, and on level ground you come to the Agriturismo Ferdy near Scalvino, a hamlet of Lenna, at about 460 metres. In front of the farm an iron bridge leads onto the Valle Brembana cycle path (Percorsi MTB Val Brembana, OpenStreetMap).

The traverse does not return to its starting point. The simplest solution is to leave a second car at Scalvino; in April 2024 the CAI Valserina subsection organised the return with a private coach. Anyone wanting to walk back must allow another 5 hours of climbing on the same path, according to the CAI.

Arriving on the Valle Brembana cycle path, built largely on the bed of the Zogno-Piazza Brembana railway that closed in 1966 (Wikipedia), opens other options too: Percorsi MTB Val Brembana, for instance, rides back to San Pellegrino Terme in 11.5 kilometres. From Scalvino you can also close a loop on foot by climbing to the Passo dell'Ortighera along the old cattle track of Dossena and coming down to Lenna (Il Blog della Valserina).

The shape of the valley depends on its rocks. The upper part, where the meadows and the hamlets of Oltre il Colle lie, is made of soft rocks of lagoon and delta origin, marly limestones, marls and siltstones, which erode easily and give gentle slopes; on top of them rest the harder dolomites of the Dolomia Principale, which form the spires and towers between the Menna, the Arera and the Alben.

Just downstream of the bridge on the road between Oltre il Colle and Zorzone the rock changes abruptly: you enter the very hard Esino limestone, the remains of an ancient carbonate platform, into which the Parina stream has cut the orridi, deep gorges with unusual erosion forms (Il Blog della Valserina). The gorge is also used for canyoning descents, which require specific skills and a guide.

The rails you meet at the bottom of the valley belong to a narrow-gauge service line, different from the Valle Brembana railway, which was standard gauge (Wikipedia). At the end of the First World War the forests of the Brembana valley had been depleted by the demand for firewood and for fuel for furnaces, including those of the mines, and what remained to be exploited was the great beech and hornbeam forest of the Val Parina. To bring the timber out, a road of about three kilometres was dug by hand from the confluence with the Brembo, with tunnels, bridges and retaining walls to keep the gradient constant for the wagons on the rails.

From the felling areas the wood came down on overhead cables to the terminus, travelled on the rails to the Brembo, crossed it again hanging from a cable and from there left on horse-drawn carts for Milan and the river ports of the plain. Some twenty woodcutters worked there permanently, joined by dozens of seasonal workers; around the 1940s up to 300 men worked in the valley. With the marble quarries the road was completed with a bridge over the Brembo and the mules were replaced by a Decauville locomotive; timber and quarrying stopped between the late 1950s and the early 1960s, and a violent cloudburst later destroyed part of the works, including the bridge, of which only the pier bases remain (Il Blog della Valserina).

The Valle Brembana railway, for its part, counted the marbles of the Val Parina among the goods it carried (Wikipedia).

Special Area of Conservation IT2060008 Valle Parina covers 2,225 hectares between 470 and 2,299 metres, in the municipalities of Dossena, Lenna, Oltre il Colle, San Giovanni Bianco and Serina, from the Cima di Menna to the mouth of the Parina (Province of Bergamo). It matters for its gorge habitats, ravine woods, petrifying springs and overhanging cliffs, for the continuity of its forest and for the absence of infrastructure: human impact is among the lowest on the southern side of the Orobie.

The provincial description mentions the hop-hornbeam and beech woods of the limestone slopes, the scrub with Cytisus emeriflorus, a shrub almost exclusive to the Lombard Prealps, a flora rich in rare and endemic species, black grouse and the golden eagle, which nests here. It also recalls that much of the valley, facing south between 600 and 1,500 metres, is prone to fires: so do not light fires, do not pick anything and do not leave the path.

The exposed chained sections are the critical point, especially with wet rock or gravel. In the valley there are no houses, huts or shelters and you usually meet nobody (Il Blog della Valserina); the mountain-bike description adds that there is no mobile signal and that vipers are not rare in summer. Go in company, tell someone your expected time and choose a day of good weather and dry ground.

The CAI recommends boots and mid-mountain clothing; the CAI Valserina sheet adds poles, layered clothing and a packed lunch, because there are no huts or refreshment points along the valley.