August 2019: I spent a week with three friends in Lake Como. What had started out as an idea of holing up in a rustic farmhouse in a rural Italian village to lazily swim and dine outdoors eventually turned into, through lots of back forth, a week in glamorous Lake Como.
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| View of the lake from Belvedere di Pigra |
Before going, Lake Como conjured up some specific images in my mind: 1) tourists all over the place, 2) rip-off prices, and 3) mediocre, veering on bad, food. In retrospect, perhaps I was just projecting my experiences with Rome in the summer, particularly in the most touristy spots, onto glitzy, glamorous Lake Como. But in the end, spending a sun-drenched week in Italy with friends, who was I to say no to that?
Luckily, and surprisingly, I found Lake Como to be the exact opposite of the three images in my mind and to offer much more.
Even in the middle of August, it felt like we had Lake Como to ourselves.
Lake Como is a big place. Its perimeter is more than 100 miles long and is dotted with little towns along the hillside practically the whole way. Some towns, like Varenna, Menaggio, and Bellagio, are more famous than others, but for the most part, the towns seemed like places where people actually lived as opposed to simply pandering to tourists. Granted we were in town right before Ferragosto, the national summer vacation period, there just didn't seem to be that many tourists around.
We booked 8 nights at an Airbnb that looked out right onto the lake in the town of Nesso, equidistant from Como and Bellagio. It felt as if we'd moved into a rustic Italian town. On the first night, we hit up a block party at the town square and danced to Italian oldies while eating polenta and German sausages and killing 6 euro bottles of wine. On other nights, in that same square, we watched high schoolers play soccer. During the day, the space transformed into a farmer's market peddling some of the most vibrant-looking fruits and vegetables I'd ever seen. Few spoke English, so we resorted to butchering Italian pronunciations and mashing up French and Spanish to make ourselves understood.
Integrating into a low-key Italian village was exactly the vibe I didn't expect to find in Lake Como.
There isn't much to sightsee, which is a good thing.
For the most part, there weren't really tourist destinations to hit up. Bellagio may have been the exception here, as it was truly crawling with tourists everywhere. In my opinion, however, day trippers to Bellagio would surely be let down. The view of the lake from Bellagio was nothing special, nor was the town particularly nice. Whatever charm the town did possess, mostly through the impeccably manicured villas and pleasant lakeside cafés, was invariably overshadowed by the swarms of people everywhere. Besides a meal and maybe an hour or two of walking around, there just wasn't all that much to do in Bellagio.
Instead, the days were best enjoyed lazily lounging around, waking up to espressos, taking dips into the warm-enough water down by the swimming hole, savoring simple meals on the terrace, going on walks through nearby towns, and taking the fattest naps we'd had in ages. On days we wanted to take on some more structured sightseeing, we toured Villa Balbianello in Lenno, did some wine tasting in Valtellina (to the northeast of Lake Como), passed the Swiss border into Lugano, and did a day trip to Milan (wouldn't recommend doing so in the middle of summer holidays; everyone is gone, no joke!). These were pleasant diversions from sitting on our balcony, but not must do's (the exception perhaps being wine tasting in Valtellina; that Sfursat was tasty!).
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| Many hours spent lounging on our balcony |
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Actually, there was one must-do activity I'd highlight: taking a boat out onto the lake. Boats can be launched all around the lake, don't require a license to operate, and can be driven to all three fingers of the lake. At no point did the lake feel overcrowded, even in front of the most touristy of attractions, like Villa Balbianello, which was an awesome spot to park and chill at. We brought speakers and snacks, and just sailed all around for 3 hours, stopping here and there to dive into the water. We could've easily gone for much longer, but unfortunately the later slots were booked up. It's worth being flexible here since on multiple days, either the water ended up being too choppy or the weather was stormy. Out of 9 days, conditions were only just right on probably 2 or 3.
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| By boat, you can explore nooks and crannies along the lake and just soak up the sun (which eventually came out in full force) |
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| You can sail right up to different towns |
Maybe I'm too used to San Francisco/New York pricing, but nothing felt prohibitively expensive.
The private boat was 200 euros for 3 hours.
The Airbnb worked out to be about 200 euros a night, split 4 ways.
Eating out cost as little as 7 euros for simple lunches with beers. Nice dinners rarely broke 40 euros, even including drinks. The primary exception was lunch at Materia, which was 75 euros for a free experimentation six-course meal and ~35 euros for a well-executed wine pairing. Given that it's a 1 Michelin star place (the highest rated in Lake Como) with impressively memorable dishes, that's not too shabby either. Vibe was also very relaxed, might I add. Not at all pretentious or stuffy, while still remaining professional.
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| Still dreaming of this butter linguine with fish sauce and amchoor paired with Sabbiagialla orange wine at Materia |
Food was generally excellent.
Regardless whether it was the pizza, pasta, risotto, cheese, gelato, fresh peaches and apricots, or wine, nothing was disappointing. Sure, some meals were more forgettable than others (and I learned that anchovy pizza is not my jam), but more often than not, we had great meals wherever we went. There was no need to fear that we wouldn't eat well.
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| Beautiful fresh produce at the local farmer's market |
Oh, and Materia was well worth booking in advance.
All in all, Lake Como surprisingly lived up to being a low-key spot to unwind for a week.
That said, a few considerations to keep in mind if you go:
- A car is a must: To freely explore towns to your heart's content, you need a car.
- But don't speed: First off, it's probably pretty dangerous to do so given that the roads could barely fit one car going in one direction yet were expected to be two-way. Secondly, there are speed cameras everywhere, and they definitely enforce.
- And be careful at gas stations: Maybe I had bad luck, but at self-service pumps, I encountered a bunch of dead prepaid kiosks, meaning I'd slip a 50 euro bill only to not be able to eke out even a drop of gas. Try to go for full service stations if you can and just pay the attendant by credit card or Apple Pay once you're all filled up and good to go.
- Be patient with parking: Towns are small, so parking is limited. You'll likely have to circle a bunch or find a lot a little further out, particularly for specific tourist attractions later in the day.
- Know your car's limits: On some roads, your car may not be able to fit. Google Maps does not seem to have any consideration for the size of the road when giving directions. If it looks too tight, it's better to be safe than sorry. We drove a BMW X1 around, which was petite enough to handle most roads.
- Most importantly, if you only have a day, just don't go: Perhaps even with 2 or 3 days, I'd say don't go. You'd spend too much of your time simply getting to the lake, and you wouldn't have enough time to unwind and just soak up the atmosphere of being there and slowing down. In total, we spent 9 days on the lake. Maybe only on the last day did we find ourselves a little antsy about having been there for so long.
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