I still remember the first time I visited Valnontey and the whole family hiked up to the Vittorio Sella shelter. The beautiful view of the glaciers around and the river streaming down the deep groove in the valley. I was very excited to be in a national park. That was the closest thing to the dream of, one day, visiting the big national parks that I was seeing in documentaries on TV or reading about in books – dream that actually became true many years later.
It was a memorable day. We saw many animals, in a wonderful natural
environment: fat cute marmots, the elegant and fast chamois and the
regal ibex. I remember how my Dad saw this huge male from such a distance and ran up to the ridge of the mountain to take a video with his 8mm videocamera: it was worth it, the big animal hadn't moved and my Dad took a great shot (I can see myself doing that now).
Since then, I have visited the park many times and I have been lucky to see steinbocks and chamois pasturing among the high mountain peaks or running like dare-devils on steep rocks.
But during the most recent visits, I hadn't been that lucky, maybe also because I hadn't that much time to walk around the valley or really look for the animals. While I was planning another trip to the national park, however, during a walk to a pass between Val d'Aosta and Piemonte, we were lucky to encounter a couple of beautiful male steinbocks.
I wouldn't have seen them, but I kept looking around me because I knew there might be animals in the area, and I was hoping to spot them. And in fact, while we were walking on a trail, higher on the side of the mountain we saw a first male approaching. Low clouds were at times obstructing the view with a thin fog, but we were pretty close to the animal to seee him well.
After a minute we spotted a second male, larger than the first one, with huge curved horns, coming after him. We looked at him walking and jumping on the steep rocks, but also posing for a classic shot, as if he was saying: "Yes, it's me, the king of the Alps."
I kept shooting, until they both went past the ridge and we let them go, without running after them, happy with the wonderful view that these majestic animals had given us.
