A little bit of history

On its municipal territory is the highest mountain in Italy and central Europe: Mont Blanc, and is a renowned winter and summer tourist resort in the Alps.

Courmayeur (1.224 m, 4.015 ft), 27 kilometres (16 miles) north-west of Aosta, is the last municipality to be met before arriving in France via the Mont Blanc Tunnel (which connects it to Chamonix); it crosses the Dora Baltea, a river that comes from the confluence of two streams, each of which crosses respectively Val Ferret and Val Veny.

Courmayeur retains an authentic alpine atmosphere, which can be breathed both walking through the shops of the central Via Roma, and in the traditional villages that surround the main core of the village and go up to the head of the central valley.

Its popularity was linked to thermal tourism in the 17th century, thanks to the four sources of sulphurous water. In the second half of the 18th century, exploration and study of the mountains of the Mont Blanc massif began, and the search for the way to reach the summit. During the 19th century, the royal family stayed there regularly.