Departing Bergamo turned out to be the most difficult part
of our journey to Lago d’Orta. Getting
directions from a person in Italy has many challenges. You can be sure that whomever you ask does
not have the latest information on road closures, traffic conditions,
diversions due to construction or even a sense of which direction you should
take to get to your requested city. Instead, you can only be sure that they
will be confident and self-assured in giving you directions, regardless of
whether they know what they are doing or not.
Thus our frustration in departing beautiful Bergamo.
Once we drove around the entire perimeter of the city, Cindy
finally noticed a sign that took us in the direction we wanted. I had decided to take the “blue” roads on the
map, toll free, as opposed to the “green” fast roads with tolls. I am
stupid! We have lived in Italy, we have
driven in Italy and we - I - should know better, as Cindy reminded me when we
hit our twenty-fifth roundabout in six kilometers. (From
CCE: to be fair, I told him multiple
times before we left Bergamo that back roads were not a good idea. Smirk.
But I did not insist, so off we went.)
We were behind enormous trucks almost the entire time, thus taking away
the views I had thought we would have on the smaller roads. Instead of taking less than two hours it took
more than three and only the last twenty minutes were fun driving with
beautiful views.
When we finally reached our hotel on the lake in downtown Pettenenasco I was weary and
couldn’t wait to change and walk around the lake. The weather was very cool and sunless, a
condition that would continue every day of our stay, but we enjoyed the peace
and quiet of the lake and the glorious fresh air for which these lakes are known. Upon our return we had a Campari Corretto,
Campari on the rocks and procecco, a lovely sparkling wine. Most refreshing and perfect for our pre-nap
apperitivi.
Our dinner that night in the hotel was very
disappointing. We had a lovely table
overlooking the lake and the menu held great promise, but the food was tired,
over treated and over thought. They were
trying to be cute instead of focusing on the simple preparations that have made
Italian cuisine so wonderful for so long.
We ended the evening sitting on our balcony enjoying the foggy night
over glasses of Vecchia Romagna.
For the next several days we had pretty much the same
routine, up by nine, walking and running around the lake, breakfast just before
they closed at ten and then back out to explore the little city and the large
lake. It was glorious, tranquil and
refreshing. Our dear friends Bob and
Mary, who work in Milan, joined us for the last two nights and we found a great
little pizzeria/restaurant which did things right and we had great meals with
good wines at great prices. It was a ma
and pa operation where ma waited on the customers and pa made all the food,
especially the great pizzas, and at the end of the dinner she came around with complimentary
glasses of Limoncello and
a plate of cookies. On our second night
she just delivered the bottle and left it with us so as to save her time on any
refills!
We are now at the Sheraton Malpensa (airport) and tomorrow
we depart for Athens to pick up the cruise.
It has been a lovely vacation and we are well rested and ready for the
next half of our vacation from retirement.
Here are a few photos from the lake.
Ciao, Cindy and William
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| Lakefront Pheasant |
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| Town Church and Tower |
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| Fanciful Lakeside Sculpture |
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