This is a very short, easy and pleasant walk, which starts off from the hamlet of Dont following the course of the torrent Duràn as far as Sottorogno. From here you can continue for a short way as far as a fountain of spring water and then go up to Pradel and return to Dont along the provincial road 347 for Passo Duràn.
Leaving behind the provincial road 251 at the entrance to the village of Dont (931 m), park in the available space beside the playground, near the confluence of the torrents Duràm and Maè. In past centuries Dont, apart from being known for its iron mines and blast furnaces, was an important cross-roads, because the road for Passo Duràn leaves from here (and still does) to go to Agordo and the Val Cordèvole.
The etymology of the name (zonta=added) indicates that this is where additional horses were attached to the carts in order to brave the steep road up to the pass. To get to Sottorogno follow the dirt road on the left (west) which goes into the valley of the Duràm, coming to a bridge over the river beside the last houses (signpost on the left for Colcerver) keep going straight, leaving on the left a deposit for gas tanks and on the right a pile of wood. The road, still marked by old kerb stones and a stone wall with curved stones, continues for a few hundred metres, and after a wide space (with a bench) you reach the hamlet of Sottorogno (963 m, 15 mins.).
The quiet little village still has some old hay-lofts and houses, some restructured. The painter, Emiliano Piva, lives in the second house on the right, whose pictures are on show and also up on the open gallery. Continuing in a south-westerly direction, follow the mule track on the left which goes along the flat and into a forestry road which crosses a bridge over the river Duràm and then keeps going on to the Tabià Ronch and Colcerver (no. 537, on the right of the second bridge, which crosses the Ru Asinera and after a few hundred metres there is a nice fountain with water coming from a nearby spring). From Sottorogno, instead of repeating the outward walk it is possible to return by Dont on the SP 347 of the Duràn pass: back to the village on the asphalt road which goes up to Pradèl (1.015 m) and from here go down the provincial road dominated by the church of Saint Catherine on the right.
The valley of the ice-cream makers
The people of the Zoldo Valley, always forced to emigrate in search of work, did their best in every field: shipwrights in Venice, carpenters in the building of roads and dykes, woodsmen, mechanics, pastry makers, peddlers of cooked pears and candied fruit. From the mid-19th century the Zoldo Valley inhabitants started to produce and sell their own ice-cream, which after the Second World War became their distinctive product, so much so that today the Val di Zoldo is known as the "valle dei gelatieri" (valley of the ice-cream makers). Today the Zoldo ice-cream makers are scattered all over the world, in Italy and Germany especially, but also as far away as Peru, Japan, China and South Africa.
