Lukmanier is the quiet sister of the great Gotthard, and for most of its history it was the more important of the two. At 1,915 metres it links Disentis in Graubünden with the Blenio valley in Ticino, and Romans, monks and emperors used it long before the Gotthard became practical. For a rider looking for an easy way back toward the north or south, it offers a long, calm descent without the cobbles and queues.
The northern approach starts at Disentis, where a large Benedictine abbey stands on a terrace above the Rhine valley, founded in the early Middle Ages and still home to a community of monks. The abbey church is a Baroque confection that rises over the village, and a visit is a calm interlude. From there the road climbs up the Val Medel, past old Romansh villages with stone houses and small chapels, and then breaks out onto the pass through a landscape of lakes and low peaks.
At the top is the Lai da Sontga Maria, a reservoir with a small chapel on its shore, and the road follows the water for several kilometres. The view is open and quiet, with wind-bent larches and rock slabs. The southern descent takes you down through Olivone and the Val Blenio, a green, steep valley where chestnut woods give way to vineyards and old stone villages, with the road dropping quickly and the air growing warmer with every bend.
The riding is easy and the surface is good, with long bends and few hairpins, and the traffic is light compared with the main passes. The pass is closed in winter, from around November until late spring, and in early summer snow lines the road. It is an ideal late-afternoon pass, when the light turns the slopes gold and the day-trippers have gone home.