Tires
Tires (German: Tiers), officially Tires al Catinaccio (Tiers am Rosengarten), is a municipality in the Val di Tires, a side valley...
Updated 17 July 2026
This season · July · Summer
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The story
The story of Tires
Tires at the Foot of the Catinaccio
Tires lies in the Val di Tires, a side valley of the Val d'Isarco that runs south-east until it closes against the walls of the Catinaccio, the Dolomite group that marks its eastern and southern boundary and gives the municipality its German name, Tiers am Rosengarten. The main village, with the parish church of San Giorgio, sits at 1,028 metres on a sunny terrace halfway up the slope; the municipal territory, covering more than 42 square kilometres, ranges from about 700 metres on the valley floor to over 3,000 metres at the highest peaks of the Catinaccio d'Antermoia group. The municipality includes the hamlets of Bria, San Cipriano, Bagni di Lavina Bianca, Gemeier, Kantun and Villa di Mezzo, each perched on its own panoramic balcony facing the rocky teeth of the massif. The community, numbering around 1,000 residents, is overwhelmingly German-speaking, with Italian and Ladin minorities, and falls within the Salto-Sciliar district administration.
The Catinaccio and the Legend of King Laurin
The Catinaccio, known in German as Rosengarten, is the setting of one of the best-known Dolomite legends, that of King Laurin, ruler of a people of dwarves who mined the mountains for crystals, gold and silver. Having fallen in love with a maiden, Laurin abducted her to his fabled rose garden, until the knights who came to free her defeated him when the glow of the roses betrayed, at dusk, his cloak of invisibility. Furious, the dwarf king cursed the garden so that no human eye could ever see its beauty again, by day or by night, but forgot to include dawn and dusk: this, according to legend, is the origin of the enrosadira, the phenomenon by which the walls of the Catinaccio blaze pink and violet as the sun sets. Above San Cipriano, the broad panoramic meadow of the Proa is one of the most striking places to admire the spectacle, with the Catinaccio's profile glowing directly above the village.
The Sciliar-Catinaccio Nature Park and Hiking
Since 2003, a large part of the municipal territory of Tires has fallen within the Sciliar-Catinaccio Nature Park, one of South Tyrol's seven nature parks and part of the Dolomites UNESCO World Heritage Site, protecting spruce and larch forests, high-altitude pastures and the massif's sheer rock walls. From the Val Ciamin above Tires, a trail crosses the wild Bärenloch gorge, a rocky stretch fitted with fixed ropes, to reach the Alpe di Tires refuge (Tierser Alpl), at 2,440 metres at the foot of the Denti di Terrarossa. Built from 1957 by the Aichner family, who still run it today, the refuge is the starting point for the Maximilian and Laurenzi via ferratas, the latter linking to the Rifugio Antermoia in the Val di Fassa, classic destinations for hikers and climbers who explore the Catinaccio group from this less-trodden side.
Landscape, Springs and Nature
The landscape of the Val di Tires alternates woods, meadows and rocky outcrops along its whole length. At the hamlet of Bagni di Lavina Bianca, the German name Weißlahnbad recalls the old white-gravel quarry (Weißlahn) and the curative springs that, from 1811 onward, made the place a renowned spa resort for treating rheumatism and gastric ailments, a service today reserved for guests of the historic hotel built around the baths. From San Cipriano, about 45 minutes' walk leads to Lake Wuhnleger, at 1,402 metres, a small mirror-like lake that reflects the Catinaccio's profile at sunset and is a popular easy walk even in winter. Higher up, the already mentioned Bärenloch gorge, in the Val Ciamin, offers a more demanding hiking experience, through narrow rock walls and rope-secured passages.
History and Experiences
The name Tires first appears in a document of the diocese of Freising dated between 993 and 1005, as Tieres, a form derived from the Latin terra. The parish church of San Giorgio Martire, rebuilt in the eighteenth century on the fifteenth-century choir of an older building, preserves at the base of its bell tower a structure dating to 1332, topped by the characteristic onion dome erected in 1738-39. An overwhelmingly German-speaking community, with Italian and Ladin minorities, Tires has paired its ancient mountain vocation with year-round active tourism: since Christmas 2022 a modern cable car has linked San Cipriano to the Malga Frommer, opening access to the Carezza ski area within minutes and confirming the village's role as a gateway to the Catinaccio in both summer and winter.
Not to be missed
- The Church of San Giorgio Martire, with its 14th-century bell tower topped by an onion dome
- A hike to the Alpe di Tires refuge (Tierser Alpl) and the Maximilian and Laurenzi via ferratas
- The climb through the Bärenloch gorge via the Val Ciamin
- Lake Wuhnleger above San Cipriano
- The Catinaccio's enrosadira glow seen from the Proa meadow above San Cipriano
To see
What to see in Tires
Routes · Trovido Route
