Geography
The Gotthard Pass connects the cantons of Uri (north) and Ticino (south). The pass itself is located within the latter canton, about 2 km south of the border with Uri, between the massifs of Pizzo Lucendro (west) and Pizzo Centrale (east). The pass lies on the most important route between the southern canton of Ticino and central Switzerland as well as most of the northern part of the country. It is the most direct link between Zürich and Lugano and also between some regions of Germany and Italy. The nearest towns are Hospental (7 km north) near Andermatt and Airolo (4 km south), respectively in the valleys of Urseren and Leventina. The region of Andermatt lies at the foot of the Furka and Oberalp passes connecting the Rhone and Rhine valleys thus making the Gotthard area a strategic place for transports and military (the Swiss Réduit for instance).
The hospice (Italian: Ospizio) is located south of the pass at 2,091 m, near the Lago della Piazza and other small lakes. Lago di Lucendro and Lago Sella are larger reservoir lakes accessible from the pass.
Read more about this topic: Gotthard Pass
Famous quotes containing the word geography:
“The totality of our so-called knowledge or beliefs, from the most casual matters of geography and history to the profoundest laws of atomic physics or even of pure mathematics and logic, is a man-made fabric which impinges on experience only along the edges. Or, to change the figure, total science is like a field of force whose boundary conditions are experience.”
—Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)
“Ktaadn, near which we were to pass the next day, is said to mean “Highest Land.” So much geography is there in their names.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Where the heart is, there the muses, there the gods sojourn, and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts, Connecticut River, and Boston Bay, you think paltry places, and the ear loves names of foreign and classic topography. But here we are; and, if we tarry a little, we may come to learn that here is best. See to it, only, that thyself is here;—and art and nature, hope and fate, friends, angels, and the Supreme Being, shall not absent from the chamber where thou sittest.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)