ᐅ Summit Nº 31 Mount Titano (San Marino)

SUMMITS

SUMMIT Nº 31: MOUNT TITANO (SAN MARINO)

SAN MARINO

MOUNT TITANO

23/11/2025

ALTITUDE

739 m

ÀLEX PORTERO AND ANDREU LÓPEZ

DIFFICULTY LEVEL

LOW

CHRONICLE

Àlex Portero and I have known each other since 2012, when we began to share professional paths in a financial consulting firm in Barcelona. Professionally, I have always found it difficult to work in a team, although with Àlex we had great rapport and understanding from the very first moment. Initially, we only shared business plans, Due Diligences, debt restructuring plans, and business valuations, among others, and subsequently, we shared a trip to Egypt in the midst of the Arab Spring, which marked a before and after in our relationship with anecdotes we will remember forever.

I left the company where we worked in April 2014, and although we stopped sharing the daily grind and financial reports, the friendship endured, and since then we have shared a few more trips, dinners, some parties, Àlex has also joined me on some mountain outings and oops, I forgot… we also shared a trip to San Marino, so enough with the preliminaries and let’s get to the action.

I pick up Àlex in the town of Esplugues where he lives with his partner Carla and their two children: Paula and Gerard. It’s Saturday, 6:30 in the morning, and we are heading towards Terminal 2 of the Josep Tarradellas Airport. It’s the second time this month I’ve been here, and I think I’ll seriously consider asking AENA for a “free pass” or any special treatment… moving on to more serious matters, at 8:50 we lift off the ground with a Ryanair flight heading to Bologna.

This time the rental car is not with Europcar (very expensive, extremely expensive, the Bologna branch) and the chosen company is Gold Car. With our Ford Puma, we head to the city center which, by the way, is especially crowded this weekend as it hosts the final of the Davis Cup tennis tournament.

We enjoy a beautiful, yet freezing, walk through one of the largest and best-preserved medieval urban centers in Europe. We are also very struck by the famous porticoes which received the prestigious UNESCO recognition in 2021 for their artistic and sociocultural value. With a total length of 62 kilometers, 42 of which are in the historical center, the porticoes of Bologna, along with the towers, are the symbol of the city and have been the social meeting point of the capital of Emilia-Romagna for centuries. And we cannot leave Bologna without first stopping by the University of Bologna which, founded in 1088, is the oldest university in the Western world.

At dusk, we arrive at the town of Rimini, which for us will serve merely as accommodation. It is a coastal city that, during the summer season, sees its beaches crowded and full of bathers. That is not the case on this trip; we are in the middle of November, and the wide hotel offer and few tourists will allow us to obtain very competitive prices along with good quality. Good value for money that we would not have found in **San Marino** with a much more limited offer of hotel rooms and, therefore, higher prices. And I think after this economic analysis of the local economy, we have earned dinner.

We have a pizza that is not the best in the world and talk a bit with Àlex about how to organize the next day in the Republic of San Marino. And we don’t linger any longer since we’ve been traveling for hours, and it’s time to get horizontal.

We have breakfast at the hotel and, once fed, we head to the Republic of San Marino, which is about 40 minutes away by car. San Marino is a rarity, a mountainous microstate surrounded by the north-central area of Italy that has been independent since 301 AD. On the slopes of Mount Titano is the capital, also called San Marino, known for its old medieval walled city and narrow cobblestone streets. Famous are the Three Towers, castle-like citadels dating from the 11th century and located on the surrounding peaks of Mount Titano. The Republic of San Marino has only 34,000 inhabitants and a Parliament made up of 60 members, and

And when on the horizon we spot a geographical feature in the landscape that can be none other than Mount Titano, we get a surprise that, despite accumulating years, is always pleasant and exciting to see: the mountain is covered with snow.

The 6-kilometer urban route we had planned thus has a last-minute surprise guest (it snowed last night) which, although it turns the medieval city and its towers into a fairytale setting, makes us progress through the city streets with extreme caution as there are stretches with ice that are very dangerous. The Three Towers follow one another at a distance of less than 2 kilometers, and the second tower is the highest point, and at the same time the ceiling of the country, at 739 meters, where we immortalize the moment with Àlex, taking some photographs with the country’s flag.

The route is not long, and we have a couple of hours left in the afternoon, which we spend visiting a museum such as the Coin and Stamp Museum (a different, recommended museum) which is included in the general entrance ticket that allowed us to visit the walled complex, as well as the Three Towers. When daylight starts to fade, we conclude our visit to this curious republic. Dedicating one day is more than enough to get an idea of what the country is like, a country very oriented towards services and commerce with multiple souvenir shops, perfume sales, as well as weapons, among others.

This outing with Àlex is quite short, only 3 days, although it allows us to disconnect from the daily grind, have fun, and at the same time get to know a bit of the world. It is my 31st summit in the context of TSOW, and I like that new faces that have been and are part of my life are being incorporated into the project. Today is the last dinner, and we choose a restaurant that is up to the mark. Needless to say, we make the grand finale by eating pasta, but then again, the Italians are the kings of this.

We wake up at a generous hour, and once we’ve had breakfast, we check out of the hotel and go to see the endless beach of Rimini, which honestly stresses me out. It features different numbered sections, each housing a beach bar (*chiringuito*), hundreds of sunbeds, a beach volleyball court, playgrounds, changing rooms, and small houses to store equipment… I don’t even want to imagine it in the summer.

While having breakfast, we realized that the city of Imola is located between Rimini and Bologna. Imola is famous for hosting the F1 motor racing Grand Prix for years, so even though neither Àlex nor the person writing these lines are great lovers of the motoring world, we are curious to visit it.

The Emilia-Romagna region is characterized by being an important motoring “hub,” and brands like Ferrari, Maserati, and Lamborghini have their headquarters here, which was one of the factors that drove the creation of the circuit.

Upon arrival in Imola, not much of the circuit can be seen as most of the accesses are restricted, including the entrance to the museum, which is under construction. Despite this limitation, we can walk through a green area where, curiously, there is a statue, as well as multiple dedications that pay tribute to the figure of the Brazilian legend and 3-time world champion Ayrton Senna, who tragically lost his life in an accident while competing on the circuit.

We leave Imola and head to the airport. We drop off the car in the designated return areas stipulated by Gold Car and proceed to pass through security checks, as well as to wait for our return Ryanair flight, which is a real bargain since the round trip cost us only 44.50 euros.

It has been a brief outing, although when we arrive in Barcelona, we feel like we have been away for a week, which is a sign that the trip went very well for both of us to disconnect. Àlex’s daily life leaves him little free time, but we found a space in the calendar for him to make his debut in TSOW. He is one of my great friends, so I am very happy that he has been a co-protagonist of this Chapter 31. And that’s it, the European trips / getaways for this year 2025 are over, and we are preparing the countdown for the Aconcagua – Ojos del Salado expedition.