Lake Como

Lake Como is famous for all the wrong reasons. It's a popular holiday destination, which means it's over-commercialised. It's also inhabited by quite a few Hollywood stars like George Clooney and the likes. Yuk. Not my cup of tea then. As we were closing in on it I was wondering why we were going there in the first place. 'Because it's supposed to be beautiful!' my travelling companions said. I was quietly hoping it would be…

We had noticed on the map that there are a lot of campgrounds and hotels along the shores… laid out like sausages on a barbecue. Not a good sign. At the same time we were late in the season, which should mean fewer tourists. As it turned out there was hardly anyone there! We stayed for a few nights to visit the area and have a look at a factory... more on which in the next post (although we give a little bit away in the video)! We shared a campground with just 2 other campers. A german couple with a nice split-screen VW Kombi and a Dutch couple on BMWs.

Mike trying a
European Learner
Bike...

The weather wasn't doing Lake Como any favours. Not too bad when we arrived, it turned misty grey for the following days. At times we could hardly see the lake, let alone the other side. Still, we walked through the small town of Domaso and rode along the shores. We also took a bit of rest too as fatigue was by then seriously beginning to hamper us. Hardly surprising considering the long days we had made in the weeks before as we wanted to ride as many passes as we could, before the winter weather set in and they would be closed.

The small town of Domaso, where we stayed in Lake Como, is a typical Italian town. Old with with narrow winding streets and centuries of history everywhere you look. A great place to stay, but perhaps not so much in summer when the tourists arrive. Now it was a heaven of tranquility. Looking for a place to get some lunch we found most establishments closed. End of season I suppose. What we found instead were Italians going about their business. Little Vespa Apes sputtering about, doing their deliveries and enhancing our Italian experience with the sweet smell of burned 2-stroke oil. Small Fiat 500s parked in areas we wouldn't even be able to park a mobility scooter and of course Vespa scooters zooming past…  

The whole experience was almost like being in a movie. Maybe that’s why the Clooneys of this world want to live here? Strangely enough the housing prices we saw weren’t even that absurd. All in all Lake Como is a nice place… at the end of summer and quite possibly early spring too. Now what's that factory I was telling you about? Hmmm, wait for the next post :-) It's going to be a good one!