7. Lake Como
This is completely out of chronological order because we visited Como fairly late on - but I know a few are about to set-off for that region so I thought I'd promote this.
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Como is one of the three largest and most famous lakes - the others being Garda and Maggiore. Como and Garda are wholly in Italy whilst Maggiore is partly in Switzerland. We'd been to Garda before so settled on Como for 3 days - it was just a quick stopover on our way home. We had a loose arrangement to meet some friends in Como on the Friday as one of them is Italian and only lives 40 mins from Como. Lake Como is like an inverted Y with Como at the bottom of the south-west leg. We started out looking for campsites around Como - but there aren't really any. There's one lakeside site on the Lecco arm (south east) but most are in the North where the lakeshore is less mountainous and there is a little more flat land. These sites are full of families and are mostly lakeside so are ideal for watersports. In the end we found a little campsite on the hill above Bellagio which is on the peninsula where the three arms join.
Camping Clarke -
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It was a good choice for us. Bellagio is a great location from which you can explore some of the nicer villages by ferry or boat. There is a regular car ferry service connecting Bellagio, Varenna, Cadenabbia and Menagio which are all towards the centre of the lake. Varenna is particularly pretty an unspoiled.
We had considered cycling along the lakeshore but we soon binned that idea - the roads are incredibly narrow and very busy. Its OK for serious cyclists who will be keeping pace with traffic - but not very pleasant for a leisurely ride. We did use the bikes between the campsite and Bellagio - great downhill on the way in - hard work on the way back.
Como is certainly very pretty and scenic. But also busy. The central area was extremely busy with mostly Amercian tourists. Como itself had a more mixed feel with many tourists of many nationalities including Italians. Most tourists don't leave the lakeshore. You don't have to go far up the hill to find tranquility. We had a great day out - Boat to Argengo, cable car up to Pigra (where there is a fantastic marked walking trail through the village, and then a walk back through the forest to Colonno with amazing vistas over the lake in the way down. Then bus to Cadenabba and the ferry back to Bellagio.
Prices for camping are high - 31 Euros per night where we stayed - even higher lakeside according to fellow campers.The ferry and boats are also pricey - approx 4 Euros per person for any trip on the ferry, more for longer journeys on the passenger boats. But the cable car and the funicular in Como are cheap and we had a great meal out with friends in Como for about 15 Euros per head.
We moved to Como itself for our last night and stayed at a camperstop there. great and good value (12 Euros) for one night but I wouldn't have stayed their longer. I'll post more about the camperstops generally later.
For a longer holiday I'd suggest 3 to 4 days per major lake would be good. There are also some smaller ones that are apparently just as scenic but more frequented by locals than on the main tourist trail.
Hope those of you heading this way have a great time.
