You need skills to drive through the Alta via Del Sale on the Maritime Alps

The Alta Via del Sale is not for the faint-hearted as there are mostly no crash barriers along the narrow alpine route. — Photos: MANUEL HOLLENBACH/dpa

To the left is a cliff wall towering overhead. To the right, the terrain abruptly drops several hundred meters. In between, a rocky road barely a couple fingers’ width wider than your car. Such scenes usually feature in blurry YouTube videos recorded on Bolivia’s “Death Road” in the Andes or dangerous stretches in the Himalayas.

However, this is no expedition in Asia or South America, but rather a drive in the Alps and, on top of it, a normal road – or at least one that the locals in this north-western corner of Italy on the border with France consider to be normal. For, ever since the military began putting up border forts and barracks up in the peaks around 150 years ago, a narrowly-meshed network of roads and paths criss-crosses this mountain range known as the Maritime Alps.