Como, Italy - My days in the Italian Lakes...

Italian food in Como...our first meal.

Blake and I decided to rule out Milan. We had heard that it 'was just a city' and after coming from Barcelona, we just wanted to get out of the city. We took a train to Lake Como instead.

It was really nice because Como is only 35 - 45 minutes away from Milan, and it's beautiful! There are tons of tiny towns that you can stay at once you get to the lake, but we just decided to stay in Como because it's the main town and it's the most accessable.

We got into Como at about noon and we stayed at a small pensione right next to the Duomo Cathedral. I'm really suprised that we found a room for so cheap! We only had to pay 40 euros each night, so we ended up staying 3 nights instead of 2 like we had originally planned.

Como, the largest town on the lake, was extremely quaint. There are tons of narrow streets with little stores and boutiques and there are tons of benches everywhere so you can just sit and take in the scenery. All of the towns on the lake are semi-close to one another as long as you take the ferry, which is what most of the tourists do.

The day we got to Como, we just ate lunch on the lake and walked around.

The next day Blake and I walked to a town that we thought was close by. The name of the town is Cernobbio...and if you look on a map, it doesn't look that far away from Como. We thought it would be a nice walk, rather than taking the ferry, and as it turns out, it's pretty far away. (Take the ferry if you ever go to Como...it's alot easier...but the walk was fun nevertheless.)

Once we got to Cernobbio, we found it to be really beautiful and it was even more quaint than Como. We stumbled across some kind of little flea market, which was really cool. It was actually a group of trucks that kind of transformed into little stores. There were tons of clothes, purses, flowers, and food. The food trucks were like a deli on wheels. Blake ended up buying some cheese and we both got some hot salami from the vendors. We had a great time. Hopefully, we walked it all of going back to Como.

One of the best parts about walking along the lake is that you get to walk by all of these huge mansions. They are all really gorgeous, but half of them look like they are unused...I guess they are probably 2nd homes or something like that.

Our last day in Como, Blake and I took the funiclar (an incline) that runs from Como, up to a hilltown called Brunate. Brunate is on top of one of the mountains that surrounds Como. (I don't know if they are actually mountains...they might be large hills.)

Our plan for the day was to pack a lunch, which we did - a couple of paninis - and then do some hiking once we got to Brunate. We hiked up one of the mountains to get to a lighthouse - we were suprised at how quickly we made it there, so we decided to keep on hiking. We started hiking to Mt. Boletto. We ended up getting there in about 1 1-2 hours later, but once we got to Mt. Bolletto, we saw an even higher peak which didn't seem that far away. We kept hiking.

We finally got to the last little bit of this hike, and it looked as if the whole thing was hopeless - the hiking path was now covered with weeds and the grass was so high that all you could hear were the bugs buzzing about.

I was really tired at this point and I wanted to forget it, and just go back down the mountain, but Blake really wanted to continue. When we finally got to the top of what was Mt. Bolleton, we found a small clearing for lunch and a gorgeous view of Lake Como. It was totally worth it. After that, we climbed back down the mountain and got some ice cream.

The food here in Italy is another thing that I have to talk about. Everything is good - EVERYTHING! There are a couple of different types of places to eat. In the ristorantes, you can basically get anything that you want, or anything on the menu at least. then, there are Trattorias, which are a step down from a ristorante. Here, they have whatever is behind their deli-type windows. Mainly, pizza and maninis. Then, of course, you have the pizzerias, which just serve pizzas - most of the time.

Blake was reading our Lonely Planet book about the different types of tourists that come to Italy. He now officially declares himself as a 'food tourist.'

We have both had some really good meals. One other thing that shouldn't be missed is the gelato (ice cream.) It's the softest ice cream I've ever had...and you can find it for as little as a euro!

The people here are alot friendlier than the people in Spain it seems. Random people will just start talking to you. They even keep talking to you after they find out that you are foreign and can't understand anything they are saying.

Everyone in Como rides a bike - even old people that you think shouldn't even be walking - and when they ride past one another they always say 'bonjourno!' It seems as if everyone knows everyone. I know this isn't true though, because people say the same thing to Blake and I and we dont know anyone.

It is also quite clear that Italians are consumed with food! The meals served at restaraunts here are a pretty good size; yet all of the waiters we've come across have looked at Blake and I like we are crazy for ordering so little. It's customary that once we give our orders, the waiter will say 'and that's all'?

The usual Italian meal consists of: appetizers and bread, a large pasta dish, a meat dish, then salad, then dessert, then coffee, and then after dinner drinks.

After all of that, I'm suprised I haven't seen even more fat people. (I guess they all ride bikes.)

Anyway, back to Como. The only bad thing about Como is the nightlife. It is nonexistant. We ended up going back to our hotel about about 9pm every night. People eat dinner here at about 7 and then they just go home. It's alot different than in Spain, where we would start eating dinner at 9:30 and go to bed between 12 and 1am. This different pace is a little hard to get used to.

Another thing that struck me as odd about Como was the haze in the air. I thought it was smog from Milan at first, but it turns out that it's just a haze.

We left Como on September 9th and took a train to Boltzano, which was the start of our next destination.