Peak 14 | Monte Titano, San Marino | 739m

When visiting the city of San Marino it is easy to see the appeal of why it was chosen for a location of a fortified settlement. The vertical cliff faces along one side of Mount Titanio make it look completely impenetrable to any potential attackers. The historic town and mountain is now a UNESCO world heritage site and the whole place seems to be crawling in history and beauty.

The highest point of San Marino — Click here to view the Instagram post

Quick Summary

• Starting point - Funivia San Marino

• Route taken - Via Viana

• Total ascent - 200 m

• Total length - 4 km round trip

• Total time - 2 hours inc. breaks

• Expense category - #Low

• Equipment - #StandardHike

• Difficulty - #Level1 of 5

• Enjoyment - #3star of 5*

As you'd probably expect, its not a particularly big hike. Even if you start at the bottom of the mountain and allowed some time for browsing the shops, taking in some of the history and stopping for regular photos, it should still be done in under an hour.

But I still wanted to do as much of the ascent as possible. So we looked out for parking spaces in the first few car parks that we came across before the road slowly winds its way up towards the top. We ended up finding a space next to the San Marino chair lift.

From here the the journey to the top consisted of a small walk up through a wooded area before entering one of the fortress gates. It then weaves its way up through the historic settlement. I found my biggest challenge for this one was not to get distracted by all the market stalls and restaurants. They all looked very nice and seemed keen for some business.

I defiantly remember reflecting on my challenge as I was walking up through the historic town - how it continues to drive me towards new countries and places that I may never of got around to seeing if it wasn't for having the end goal of completing the mountains. I wasn't even 3rd of my way through the challenge and the variety of almost everything has already amazed me and made it a very enjoyably experience.

We followed the signs to '2a Torre' or 'Second Tower'. Although the challenge only consists of reaching the summit of natural high points. This fort and tower are actually built over the highest natural point of San Antonio. So it only seemed logical to go up. However, to get into Torre 2 there is however an entrance fee. This was €4.50 at the time of my visit but there is also a weapon museum to look around included in the cost.

After we had done with the tower we stopped at one of the restaurants near the top that looks out over San Marino. I also took the opportunity to try one of the local beers. The views were lovely but we could see some heavy rain clouds incoming. We took this as our key to head down and make a start on our next journey towards Croatia.