Rifugio Salei is one of the great mountain resort experiences you can find. Staying there was a real revelation as they excelled beyond expectations in the style, service and quality of their food, rooms and amenities. The very logo on their website identifies them prominently as a “4 star” property, but take it from someone who is pretty much an expert on luxury resorts, they are every bit a 5-star experience. Not the TripAdvisor “clap-o-meter” 5 stars (which I have easily given), but the proper industry standard 5-star luxury quality. More than the quality of the property is its feel which is more like a “resort” than any other place we have stayed at skiing. Despite being marooned on the mountain slopes, the lodge has everything at your disposal – Apres Ski (lively, inviting venue for a range of warming drinks and festive atmosphere), Hotel (stylish comfortable rooms with many luxurious touches and amenities, eg. high tech mirror and soothing drench showers), Restaurant (including a distinctive piste-basher dining excursion, and Spa (!).
VIEW – Salei isn’t strictly on the “top” of a mountain, but it is close enough with 270 degree views including a stunning backdrop of towering sedimentary carbonate.
FOOD – The food was distinctively prepared and elegantly presented (see a few of my photos posted here). Prosecco included free at breakfast. But the special treat was the Friday dinner where they carted all the guests in a “piste basher” up the slope to their sister property, the “Fienile Monte”. That the ride was a treat in itself to be on one of these mechanical monsters that skiers see prowling the slopes every night. We were welcomed into their yurt with a roaring fire to a spread of delicious anti-pasta (eg. shrimp, scallop, steak tartar, etc.). Then we proceeded to their dining room for to feast on a monstrous, perfectly cooked T-bone steak.
The Special Fienile Monte Dinner Return. What they don’t tell you in all of the communication about the special Fienile Monte dinner is that the guests walk back to Rifugio Salei after the dinner is over in the dark on the ski piste. Now, it is only a few hundred yards and it is all downhill. Thinking we were being taken and retrieved, we almost wore casual shoes and light jumpers. Some other guests we saw were not wearing appropriate footwear for the short trudge in the snow.
GETTING THERE – To arrive a Rifugio Salei, you need to drive on the SS242 to the small area called “Passo Sella”. There is not much there except one establishment (Hotel Passo Sella Dolomiti), a ski lift and a some parking lots. The Rifugio lot is a very small dirt lot with a sign saying “Parking for Rifugio Salei” next to a hut (called “Bar Sella”). If you need to rent your equipment (highly recommended before checking in so that you can ski right out onto the slope and not have to go to the trouble of getting back to your car in the parking lot), then you need to go further north on the SS242 to the village of “Selva Val Gardena” about 15 minutes down the road. Be careful to *not* put “Selva Val Gardena ski resort” into your sat nav as that will take you somewhere else entirely.
SKIING OUT – Of course, the rifugio is situated smack on the famous Selaronda tour of pistes which offers one of Europe’s (if not the world’s) largest ski areas of interconnected slopes. The “tour de Selaronda” is a fun if bit ambitious full day of guided skiing all around the centerpiece of the Dolomiti area. Buying a Ski Pass. If you arrive at Rifugio Salei without having purchased a ski pass (eg. late arrival in the evening), not to worry. You can ski straight out the rifugio door down Piste 3 to a ticket “Casse”. However, as you might imagine, it is essential that you go to the correct ski route or else you are going to end up at the bottom of a run without any way to get back (with no ski pass to get on a lift). Here are the definitive directions for getting your ski pass.
- “Exit the rear of the rifugio. Turn right towards the top of a gondola named “Pradel/Rodella”. You will pretty much be following that gondola down the mountain to the ski pass “casse”. The route you are following is number “11” also referred to by some as “Tre Tre” (which one person confusingly told us was “33”, but actually it just says the words “Tre Tre” in smaller print under the “11”). As you reach the bottom of the run, there are a pair of tunnels (one going to the next lift and one for people coming the other direction to reach the Pradel/Rodella gondola. The ski passes can be purchased from a little brown hut with a big “Casse” sign in a parking lot on top of those little tunnels.
SPECIALS – The star of the show at the property is really the new spa added in the recent autumn off-season. We are quite the spa aficionados and this one ranks up there with some of the best we have enjoyed. Swim-in-swim-out heated pool with Jacuzzi jets at one end (decadence of sitting in the pool with the snow falling on our faces). Sauna, steam, lounge area (with great views of the mountain), “quiet” area custom made for napping, hot teas and refreshments. The only disappointment to the spa was the lack of massage. After a day on the slopes, we really appreciate some deep tissue work to loosen us up for the next day. We always struggle to find treatment in the Dolomites.
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