Alta Via dei Re

The Vallone della Meris (or, in the masculine, the Vallone del Merìs, pronounced with an accent on the 'i', differently from the normal pronunciation) owes its name to its favorable exposure,"a meriggio", at the meridian, which provides warmth and light.

This place, known as Chiot de la Sela, probably dervied its name from the past presence of a small "sella", a stone structure with a barrel vault, usually partially underground, which was used to store food). Chiot de la Sela was the location of the Royal Hunting Lodges, used by the Savoys when they hosted hunting parties in the Vallone della Meris.

Since the end of the eighteen hundreds(an inscription on the remains of a shelter reads "3° Compagnia Alpini, 1888") Lower Lake Valscura was chosen as the site where troops were garrisoned to defend the strategic pass of Bassa del Druos. Beginning in 1888, when barracks were erected to house 140 soldiers and two officers, for almost fifty years buildings were constructed on this site, until the entire complex was finally transformed into an armory, officially known as A131,containing munitions, explosives and artillery pieces.

The portion of the route that runs from Lower Lake Valscura to Lake Claus follows the former military mule track that linked Valscura and Fremamorta. The mule track is one of the best-preserved examples of the old military roads that ran through the Valle Gesso, as well as a true masterpiece of engineering. Realized sometime around the very first years of the nineteen hundreds, a decade prior to the start of the second world war, in 1929, it was preventively upgraded by the Dronero Battalion and maintained in perfect condition.
Over 10 km long, it never dips below an altitude of 2,000 meters and has a maximum incline of 18%. Portions of the road were skillfully paved with flagstones, still in place today.

The Refuge is named for Franco Remondino, Jr. Lieutenant of the Alpine Corps and budding local climber, who died during an ascent on the Rocca Gialeo. A half-barrel bivuoac shelter that sleeps 12 was erected in his memory and inaugurated in 1934. It was later decided to build a real refuge on the spot, in masonry, erected thanks mostly to the financial sponsorship of the Saluzzo Battalion of the Alpine Corps, the Taurinense Division of the Army Corps of Engineers and the 1st Airborne Brigade and inaugurated in 1965. Additional restructuring and extensions were completed in the year 2000.

To valorize the hiking trails along the Argentera Massif, in the last years of the nineteenth century the Liguria chapter of CAI decided to build a refuge near the upper Gias del Monighet, in the Vallone della Rovina. The Genova Refuge, as it was named, was inaugurated on 15 August 1898.
But the fate of the first refuge in the Maritime Alps was definitively sealed in 1968: the reservoir of the new Chiotas dam would submerge it permanently. ENEL assumed the task of building another refuge, which was inaugurated in 1981.
The refuge is named for Bartolomeo Figari, who as Secretary General of CAI saw both the successful conquest of K2 and the birth of the National Alpine Rescue Corps, to which he bequeathed all his worldly goods.

The two large buildings, now owned by religious groups, are said to have been built between 1865 and 1870 at the behest of Vittorio Emanuele II, to be used during his sojourns in the Royal Hunting Reserve. The one on the left, with its attractive portico decorated in horizontal stripes with the colors of the House of Savoy, was the residence of the royal entourage, while the other housed the stables.
The stables were then given to the army, which expanded the building between 1897 and 1898, transforming it into the Princess Elena barracks.