Piazza Europa, Abetone
A live webcam on Piazza Europa at the Abetone pass, 1,388 metres up in the Tuscan Apennines.
About this view
This live cam stands at Piazza Europa on the Passo dell'Abetone, 1,388 metres above sea level in the province of Pistoia, where the road crosses from Tuscany into Emilia. It is hosted by a bar on the square and faces north-east, towards the ridges of the Apennines behind the village.
The pass was a trade route long before it was a ski resort, and the square is where the village gathers: cars with skis on the roof in winter, walkers and motorcyclists in summer, and the beech woods changing around them. Skiers have come up from Florence since the 1930s to some 50 kilometres of pistes across four valleys above the pass, and Zeno Colò, the Olympic downhill champion of 1952, learned to race on these slopes.
Abetone keeps Central European Time, UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer. The ski season lasts from December to March when the snow holds, the village of some 700 people multiplies in season, and in July and August the pass is a cool refuge from the Tuscan heat below.
