Day Trips From Ormea: Garessio, Pieve di Teco & the Real Italian Alps
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If you read my Ormea guide, you already know we fell hard for this little mountain town. But part of what makes Ormea such a good base is what is around it. You are sitting right where Piedmont meets Liguria, which means medieval villages, a valley full of vineyards, and the Mediterranean closer than you would think.
Here are the day trips from Ormea we actually did, with kids, and would tell any family to do too.
Garessio: a medieval town built for wandering
Garessio is fifteen minutes down the valley and it is genuinely one of the prettiest towns around here. It made Italy’s official list of Most Beautiful Villages back in 2008, and you feel it the second you start walking. The old center is completely walkable, all stone lanes and arches and quiet corners, the kind of place where you let the kids run ahead because there are no cars to worry about.
The thing that made it for my girls was the playground down by the river. We let them loose there for an hour while we sat in the sun, and honestly, those are the moments a family trip is made of. Time the visit for the weekly market if you can. All three of these towns hold weekly markets, and they are the best way to eat your way through local cheese, focaccia, and produce while the town goes about its real life around you.
Pieve di Teco, and the young chef who came home
Cross over the pass into Liguria and you reach Pieve di Teco, a town of long, cool arcades you could walk for an afternoon. It is beautiful on its own. But the reason I am sending you here is a restaurant called I Sapori del Corso, tucked under those arcades, and the young woman behind it.
Martina is 21. She trained at ALMA, one of the best culinary schools in all of Italy, the kind of place that opens doors to kitchens anywhere in the world. And she chose to come back home. She opened this restaurant and shop with her stepmom, baking focaccia and championing the products of Liguria and Piedmont, with a team that is almost entirely women, nearly all of them under 25.
She has had to push against a town that was not sure it wanted something new. That is what got me. Because this is exactly the thing these sleepy, gorgeous, half-forgotten towns need. Young people who stay, or come back, and build. And the rest of us, the travelers, the families, the slow ones, we are the other half of that equation. When you eat at Martina’s table, you are not just having lunch. You are part of the reason a town like this gets to keep going.
Sit down. Order whatever they are baking. Tell her you came because of this.
Ormeasco wine country
This whole valley runs on a red wine called Ormeasco, and if you have even a passing love of wine, spend an afternoon with it. Over the Ligurian side in Pornassio, the Lorenzo Ramo family has been making Ormeasco di Pornassio since 1938, now led by Elena Ramo, third generation. Visiting a small family winery like this, where the person pouring your glass is the one who grew the grapes, is the kind of thing that ruins you for big commercial tastings. In the best way.
Want it organized for you?
Renting a car and doing this yourself is honestly the best way, and it is what we did. But if you would rather have a culturally immersive family trip planned for you, with the cultural depth this corner deserves, I love what Travec is building. Code BRAVEFAMILY takes 200 dollars off a family group trip.
If you are visiting in winter, the mountains here turn into proper alpine country, and there are family-friendly experiences a short drive away, like a snowcat ride up at Limone Piemonte. [GETYOURGUIDE TOUR – wrap the Limone Piemonte snowcat link through your TravelPayouts dashboard and drop it here.]
How many days do you need?
Honestly, give the area a week. Ormea as your base, then one easy day trip at a time. Garessio for the old town and the river. Pieve di Teco for lunch and the arcades. An afternoon in the vineyards. And plenty of slow mornings in Ormea itself doing nothing in particular, which is the whole point.
Everything we pack for trips like this, trail shoes to the travel stroller that has survived every cobblestone in Italy, is in my Amazon shop. And we never travel without SafetyWing for insurance.
More from this corner of Italy: our full Ormea with kids guide, and 4 off-the-beaten-path Italian towns most families miss.
Affiliate disclosure: this post contains affiliate links, including Booking.com, SafetyWing, Amazon, and Travec. If you book or buy through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Links to I Sapori del Corso, Lorenzo Ramo, and Accidental Tourist are shared simply because we love them. I only recommend people and places we truly believe in.
Xoxo, Marae: your travel mom bestie
www.bravefreetravel.com