Brunico and the Messner Mountain Museum
The castle and Messner's museum
In the heart of the Val Pusteria, at the foot of the Plan de Corones, Brunico (Bruneck) is the main town of the valley, a lively and elegant market town with a pedestrian Via Centrale (Stadtgasse) lined with colourful houses with oriels and painted façades, gates and shops. Above the town, on a wooded hill, stands the Castle of Brunico, built in the thirteenth century by the prince-bishops of Brixen, with its walls, towers and courtyards, which dominates the valley.
Since 2011 the castle has housed one of the six Messner Mountain Museums, the network of museums created by Reinhold Messner, the legendary mountaineer from South Tyrol, the first man to climb all fourteen eight-thousand-metre peaks of the world and the first, together with Peter Habeler, to climb Everest without supplementary oxygen in 1978. The museum in Brunico, MMM Ripa, is dedicated to the mountain peoples of the world, from the Sherpas of Nepal and the Tibetans to the inhabitants of the Andes, Africa and the Alps: their cultures, religions, homes, objects and ways of life in extreme environments, told through objects, photographs and installations collected by Messner during his expeditions. Other Messner museums are in Castel Firmiano near Bolzano, the main one, on the Plan de Corones, in Solda and in Juval Castle. Near Brunico, the forest cemetery and the Lumen and MMM Corones museums on the Plan de Corones complete the visit.
Tip: from the castle there is a nice view of the town and the valley; in winter, a cable car from Riscone climbs to the Plan de Corones.
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