Castione della Presolana Christmas Market

Beneath the limestone wall of the Presolana, in the upper Val Seriana, Castione della Presolana is a mountain village in the province of Bergamo, at 870 metres above sea level, which has lived off its skiers in winter and its summer visitors since the early 20th century. The Castione della Presolana Christmas market is shared between its two upland hamlets, Bratto and Dorga, with lit wooden casette on Piazzale Donizetti on the weekends of Advent, then in the old school yard in Dorga over the holidays, a Santa’s house and a little train that takes children around the village. The Christmas market opens at weekends from late November to Christmas, then every day until Epiphany; the dates of the 2026 edition have yet to be confirmed by the organiser. From France, you get there via Milan and Bergamo, by train then coach, or by plane to Orio al Serio.

The Castione della Presolana Christmas market, from Bratto to Dorga

The market is organised by Visit Presolana with the municipality, run by the agency La Bergamasca Eventi; the 2025 edition was the twenty-third, which puts the first one around 2003. The wooden casette occupy Piazzale Donizetti, between Bratto and Dorga, on the weekends of Advent, then the piazzale of the former primary school in Dorga over the holidays (to be confirmed for 2026). Lombardy’s tourism portal, in-Lombardia, counts more than thirty exhibitors: wood carvings, nativity scenes, handmade accessories, decorations and local food products. The whole thing is presented as a “spread-out Santa’s village”: the Casa di Babbo Natale can be visited by online booking, paid and non-refundable in case of cancellation, on Saturdays from 3:30pm to 6:30pm and on Sunday mornings and afternoons in 2025; the Trenino della Presolana takes children around the village, a wooden-horse carousel turns on the square, and creative workshops, Christmas concerts and musical entertainment punctuate each weekend.

The 2025 opening gives an idea of the spirit of the place. On Saturday 22 November, the ribbon of the twenty-third edition was cut on Piazza Donizetti with the switch-on of the village lights, jugglers and ponies for the children, a DJ, and a meet-up with the village’s national team athletes, a few weeks ahead of the Milan-Cortina Games. This is a valley market, run by local traders and associations, where visitors come from the towns of the plain, Bergamo and Milan, for a day of snow and mulled wine.

2026 dates to be confirmed, 2025 calendar and opening times

As of 22 September 2026, neither Visit Presolana nor the official Val Seriana portal had published the dates of the 2026 edition; an unofficial guide gives them as 21 November 2026 to 6 January 2027 while itself stating that they remain to be confirmed. In 2025, the market opened on 22 and 23 November, 29 and 30 November, 6, 7 and 8 December, 13 and 14 December, 20 and 21 December, then every day from 26 December 2025 to 6 January 2026. On Saturdays the casette ran from 10am to 7:30pm, on Sundays and on 8 December from 10am to 7pm, and from 10am to 7pm over the holiday period.

• Where: Piazzale Donizetti, between Bratto and Dorga, and the piazzale of the old school in Dorga, at about 1,000 metres above sea level, on the road to the Presolana pass.
• When: 2026 dates to be confirmed; in past years, every weekend from late November to Christmas then daily until 6 January, from 10am to 7pm or 7:30pm.
• How much: free entry; Santa’s house is booked online, in advance and for a fee; allow €10 to €25 per person with a mulled wine, a slice of cake and a wooden decoration.
• Getting around: the market’s little train takes children around the village; by car, you arrive on the SP 671 of the Val Seriana, the pass road, and park in the village.
• Nearby: Milan Christmas market and its Oh Bej! Oh Bej! fair are on the way back, and Verona Christmas market can be reached on the A4 heading east.

The squares are in the open air, at nearly 1,000 metres, and it gets cold from mid-afternoon: gloves, hat and closed shoes are a must, all the more so as snow, when it falls, stays on the ground. The organiser says nothing about wheelchair access; the squares are flat, but the village pavements are those of a mountain resort.

Getting to Castione della Presolana from France

Everything goes through Bergamo. By train, you reach Milano Centrale, on the direct TGVs and Frecciarossas from Paris that have been running again since spring 2025 (suspended from 11 September to 9 October 2026 for works at Mont-Cenis, before the season), then a regional train to Bergamo station. From the neighbouring bus station, Visit Presolana points to the line S Arriva SAB coaches to Bratto and Schilpario, or the TEB valley tram to Albino with a direct connection to Bratto; according to the online timetables, allow a little over an hour by coach between Bergamo and Castione. A local operator, Autoservizi Presolana, offers shuttles on request.

By plane, Bergamo-Orio al Serio airport is 50 kilometres from the village; Ryanair flies there from Paris-Beauvais, Marseille and Toulouse, and the ATB shuttle takes you to Bergamo station to catch the coaches. By car, you go through the Mont Blanc or Fréjus tunnel, then the A4 to the Bergamo exit and, at the valleys roundabout, the SP35 then the SP 671 of the Val Seriana up to the Presolana pass; another option from Milan takes the A35 towards Brescia with the exit at Bariano. From Lyon, it is a long half-day’s drive on toll motorways; from Paris, a full day.

The Presolana in winter: skiing, hamlets and Bergamo cooking

The Presolana massif closes the valley to the north, with summits reaching 2,521 metres within the municipality, and two ski areas: Monte Pora, whose slopes start at around 1,500 metres, and the Presolana pass, at 1,297 metres, where the Coppa Principe di Piemonte was raced as early as 1928. The hamlets of Bratto (1,036 metres), Dorga (979 metres) and Lantana stack up their hotels and holiday chalets, built for families from Bergamo and Milan who came up for the mountain air from the 1900s onwards; the municipality’s economy, long based on timber, livestock and grain, turned to tourism over the course of the 20th century. A December weekend splits between the slopes in the morning and the casette in the afternoon, when the lights come on in the square.

At the table, the Val Seriana is the land of casoncelli, meat-filled ravioli served with butter and sage, of polenta and mountain cheeses; the market stalls sell local food products, according to the regional portal, without the organiser giving details. Mulled wine is ordered here as vin brulé, as everywhere in Italy; we compared the recipes in the article on mulled wine and its variants. Bergamo, an hour away by coach, is kept for the way back: the Città Alta, its Venetian walls and the arcades of Piazza Vecchia can be visited under the December lights before heading back down to the station.