The festivals and fairs of the district are amongst the most important of south-eastern Tyrol, and at them one still sees many of the charming peasant costumes which have had here, as elsewhere, a tendency to die out. The huge silver-headed hairpins of the girls form a particularly noticeable feature of their elaborately and neatly plaited coiffures.
The main street of Cortina is a sunny and picturesque one, many of the houses possessing quaint, irregular roofs, and the church, little piazza, and hostelries making up a charming picture, with a beautiful vista of pastures and mountain summits at the end of the street.
The church, with its stately detached campanile, from the gallery of which, nearly 250 feet above the level of the street, there is a fine and extensive view of the town and valley, is one of the largest for many miles around, and contains, amongst other things, an unusually handsome altar, and some beautiful wood-carvings by Brustolone. The churchyard (unless recently altered) is a desolate though a picturesque spot, unfortunately a standing memorial of indifference for the memory of those who have passed away, and irreverent neglect.
All who reach Cortina, whether they stay long or merely for a few hours, should go to the Aquila Nera Inn, if only to see the interesting and varied paintings of two of the sons of a former proprietor named Ghedina which adorn the walls of the dining-room, staircase, the outside of the "Dependance," and even the whitewashed walls of the outhouses and stables. The subjects are of great variety, displaying in many cases much technical skill and imaginative gifts, and comprise military and religious figures and designs, grotesques, and on the walls of the square-built and solid-looking Dependance are some large groups representing painting, sculpture, architecture, and other domestic subjects, especially noticeable being the painter-like and clever manner in which modern objects, such as telegraphic instruments, cameras, steam-engines, etc., have been handled.
From the top of the campanile, in which are hung great bells, one has the village and the valley spread out at one's feet, with the Ampezzo Thal stretching north and south and the passes of Tre Croci and Tre Sassi stretching east and west.