The candlelit dinner at Stazione della Posta in Poschiavo. A large room looking on the garden, and a long wooden table at which all the inn’s guests seat. The candles and the fireplace are the only sources of light. The smells of burning wood, of the soup of the day, of the flan, and of the apple pie, all cooked on the old wood-burning stove. After dessert, we linger at the table and feel the heart-warming instant intimacy that is created among travel companions. We climb the stairs that lead to the rooms. Bonne nuit, Goodnight, Buonanotte. We fall asleep under thick handmade blankets after a hot bath in the copper tub, just like the pilgrims travelling from Italy to Switzerland did hundreds of years ago, when they and their horses rested among these walls. High wooden beds remind us of the ones we slept in as children at our grandmother’s, a stream runs under the room and breaks the absolute silence, and the starry sky is a vision we just had forgotten. Breakfast is a basket of fresh eggs, a big coffeepot grumbling on the cast-iron stove, a bowl of fresh milk to gulp, a slice of bread and homemade jam, a handful of crisp nuts, a dish of goat cheeses of the house, and a table set with the cups of the best tea service and napkins of heavy linen. Meadows and mountains are right outside the window. Again, it is the wonder of a meal that resembles a ritual, and this time it is lit by the sincere brightness of a mountain sun that promises only utter beauty.

Words and photographs Meraviglia Paper.