Varenna, Lake Como

Well today we were really excited to get out there and take a look at beautiful Verenna and Lake Como. What a disappointment to wake to thunderstorms and rain. Oh well you can’t control the weather. We will just have to make the most of it. It worked OK for me as I propped myself up at a Cafe and watched the Geelong, Adelaide (sorry Dion) game live on my iPad. Di went to our Accomodation and read her book.

The accomodation we stayed in was a small apartment just a little back from the water front. It was ok accept for the shower which was the smallest one I have ever seen. Our host Michela was very friendly and gave us a nice bottle of wine as a gift. She picked us up from the train station and then showed us around the little town of Varenna, then took us to a local wine bar where the locals hang out and shouted us a glass of wine each.

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At lunchtime the weather cleared up and the sun came out so we decided to take the ferry across the lake to the town of Bellagio.

Few places are as romantic as Lake Como, and even fewer resorts as beautiful as Bellagio. Called the “Pearl of the Lake”, Bellagio’s world class hotels and restaurants provide the perfect place to soak up the lake’s famous panorama. The village is characterised by century-old buildings, stone lanes and picturesque cobbled stairways filled with shops showcasing the finest Italian wares. It’s where the rich people hang out (present company excluded) so it is full trendy named brand shops. The pricing reflects this so needless to say we didn’t buy anything. The shoreline was beautiful with many flowering trees well worth a look. We spent a few hours wondering around and then decided to head back to Varenna on the ferry.

As we didn’t know what the weather was going to do, we decided to head up to the Castle of Vezio above the town of Varenna. The origin of the castle dates back to Roman times but it has been rebuilt a number of times as it was destroyed by warring factions through the ages.  It was quite a trek and we were glad to get to the top, but what stunning views awaited us. Well worth the trip. In the centre there was a tower with a drawbridge that you could climb, from the top you could view stunning panoramas of the lake and we rounding mountains dotted with little villages.

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By now it was getting later in the day and as we had a reservation for dinner organised we headed back to Varenna.

We started off sharing an Entrée of a selection of the local fish from the lake cooked in various ways. It was really nice. Then for main I had Lobster (of course) and Di had Pasta with local lake fish delishimomo.

That was it for day one in Varenna after a rainy start the day turned out quite well. We headed home tired mainly from the strenuous walk up to the castle.

We are hoping for a sunny day tomorrow.

Day Two

We awoke to beautiful sunshine and the wind had all but disappeared, which was strange as my weather app was telling me that it was raining.

Go figure anyway we had breakfast at a small cafe on the lake shore with a view to die for and decided that we would try to go to the meeting today. There is an English congregation in Como with is a two and a half hour ferry ride and then a 15 minute bus ride and then a 10 minute walk to get to. The ferry ride was the slow one there was a faster one but we wanted to visit all the towns along the way. Very pleasant way to travel. We left at around 11am.

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The congregation was of about 40 publishers but they get a lot more than that to their meetings, there were 74 at the meeting while we were there. The reason the brothers gave is that they have a lot of refugees that are studying as well as a lot of children and visitors from overseas like us. Like a lot of english congregations in foreign lands they use the simplified version for their Watchtower study. They were very friendly and just about all of them came up to us to introduce themselves and enquire as to where we were from. We got an invite out to dinner but the last Ferry to Varenna left at 7:20pm we wouldn’t have time.

A kind brother and sister Elisa & Cristiano Nicora, a regular pioneer couple who were assign to the congregation offered to take us back to the ferry. On the way we had a Gelato with them. Christiano’s study “God’s Gift” came with us. That’s right, I didn’t make a mistake that is his name. He is from Nigeria. The congregation is made up of probably 60% black African brothers.

The ferry we caught fro our return trip was a fast hydrofoil boat that only takes just over an hour to make the trip back to Vareena. On the way back we passed George Clooney’s house. The walk back to our apartment was just on sunset, what a great day.

OK next stop Interlaken Switzerland.