Day 1: Welcome to VarennaHotel: Hotel Royal Victoria
Word of the Day: Andiamo (Let's go/hurry up) |
Miles
New Friends
High Temperature for the Day
|
Did you know?
Lake Como is the deepest lake in Italy, measuring at about 1,345 feet deep!
Off to Varenna!
We had planned our day for a leisurely morning and getting on the train to Varenna at 9am (arriving at around 10am). Jet lag woke me up at around 5am where, upon browsing the train station website, I discovered there was a planned train strike starting at 8am. A scramble and some new train tickets later, we were set to leave on the 7am train to Varenna. Becca just barely made it, but off we went! We followed the advice in the Rick Steves' book to sit on the left side of the train from Milan to Varenna and were treated to beautiful mountain views. Once we arrived, a 10 minute walk landed us at Hotel Royal Victoria where we dropped our bags and continued our stroll down to Villa Monastero.
So...Italian gelato. Take the deliciousness of a regular ice-cream cone, times it by a million, then sprinkle it with crushed-up unicorn horns.
- Jenna Evans Welch
Varenna and Villa Monastero
It was windy and cold today as we wandered Varenna and the grounds of Villa Monastero, but the wisteria was in full bloom and just lovely. Varenna is a small town with lots of inclines and stairs so my hiking shoes got some good use. Looking out over the lake was breathtaking! Following our stroll, we sat down for dinner at an adorable restaurant across the street from the hotel.
HELPFUL HINT: The Rick Steve's Italy Guidebook (comes with your tour package) offers great suggestions for places to eat. That said, we had some of our best experiences finding little places (even supermarkets) off the beaten path, filled with locals, none of whom spoke much English, but where they were always happy to share in our enthusiasm and taste for good food!
|
Hiking to the ruins of Castilla di Vezio
Sitting high on a hill above Varenna is Vezio Castle, built in the late 11th and early 12th century. The view was spectacular, and the "ghost" sculptures are compelling and worth the very steep walk up the hill. Each year, the staff make what are essentially gauze and chalk casts of tourists who volunteer to sit and be "cast". They are dotted around the grounds of the castle, creating these eerie ghosts. The sculptures degrade over the winter and new ones are then made each summer. It is said that they are a representation of the spirit of Theodelina, Queen of the Lombards, whose spirit and soul is said to wander the castle. Definitely a little spooky, but so unique!
Buonasera, tour group!
Each day of the tour, we had a page in the lobby of our hotel, with highlights and important times/locations for meeting, as well as an Italian word or phrase of the day. This evening, we met our guide Stephanie and the other 21 travelers on our tour. Introductions with shared snacks and drinks quickly revealed that there would be much laughter on our tour. A quick walking tour of Varenna with Stephanie and our tour group ended the day.
Cruising Lake Como
Today is a dedicated to exploring Lake Como on our own. Stephanie provided us with ferry passes so we could freely travel around the lake. We decided to take the ferry to Villa Carlotta and explore the gardens. Our April timeframe meant that the azaleas and rhododendrons were in full spectacular, colorful bloom! The gardens were huge and we spent hours walking through the range of landscaping, from camellias to succulents to bamboo. The villa itself was a display for sculpture, art, and furnishings, but I really loved the decorative ceilings from the dimensional elements combined with gilding and painting on the main floor, and the trompe l'oeil (optical illusion of 3D objects on a 2D space) on the upper level ceilings. The weather was perfect and it was almost hard to believe we were here, in Italy, looking out over the lake and the mountains in the distance. We thought we would explore more towns on Lake Como, but really spent so much time in the gardens at Villa Carlotta that we just rode the ferry around the lake and then back to Varenna for dinner on our own, followed by an optional happy hour drink and snacks with our tour members and Stephanie at a local bar.