48 hours in Bellagio – the point in the middle of Lake Como

Bellagio is located on the headland where Lake Como's two southern arms divide, with views north towards the Alps. Two days are enough for the villas' gardens, the medieval stepped alleyways and the boats across the lake.

Bellagio is a municipality in the province of Como in Lombardy, built at the very tip of the headland where Lake Como, in Latin Larius, divides into two southern branches. From the headland, one looks north over the upper part of the lake towards the Alps. That location has made the town famous for two thousand years: Roman troops wintered here, sheltered from the north wind, Pliny the Younger had a summer villa on the hill, and Stendhal wrote from Villa Melzi that he had the world's most beautiful view before him, after the Bay of Naples.

Bellagio is often called the pearl of Lake Como, and it has lent its name to a casino in Las Vegas. The town itself is small, and the best plan for two days is one day on foot on the headland and one day on the water.

Day 1, morning: Borgo and the stepped alleys

The historic centre, il Borgo, lies a couple of hundred metres south-west of the tip of the promontory, between Villa Serbelloni and the lake's Como arm. Three streets run parallel to the shore in ascending order – Via Mazzini, Via Centrale and Via Garibaldi – and seven medieval stone staircases, salite, cross them up the hill. It is this rhythm, staircase by staircase, that gives Bellagio its character.

At the top lies Piazza della Chiesa with Basilica di San Giacomo, a Lombard-Romanesque church dating from 1075–1125. The bell tower is partly built upon the town's old fortifications. Inside there is a cross from the 1100s and a triptych by Foppa from 1432. On the same square stands the medieval tower Torre delle Arti. The church of San Giorgio, next to the town hall, is almost as old and was built between 1080 and 1120.

Day 1, afternoon: Villa Serbelloni's garden

Behind Borgo, on the hill in a sheltered spot, lies Villa Serbelloni. It was built in the 1400s on the site of a fortress from 1375 and has been rebuilt several times. The Sfondrati family ruled Bellagio for over two hundred years from 1533, planted cypresses and fragrant olive trees on the headland, and built a Capuchin monastery in 1614. When the last Sfondrati died in 1788, the estate passed to Count Alessandro Serbelloni.

Today only the garden is open to visitors. The paths lead up to the remains of the Capuchin monastery and Sfondrati's residence, with a view over the Lecco arm of the lake on the other side of the headland. It is here that one understands the geography: three sheets of water, two arms and a headland in between.

Down by the water lies the Grand Hotel Villa Serbelloni. It is not the same building, but a neoclassical villa built in the 1850s for a Milanese noble family, which became a hotel under the name Grand Hotel Bellagio in the 1870s and still retains its belle époque interiors. Bellagio's first hotel, today the Hotel Metropole, began as an inn as early as 1825.

Day 1, evening: Punta Spartivento and Pescallo

At the very tip of the headland, at Punta Spartivento, there is a park and a small marina. It is the natural spot for the evening light, with the lake on three sides. Then walk across the headland to Pescallo, the old fishing village on the Lecco side with its little church, San Biagio.

Bellagio's own food is simple peasant fare. Tóch is polenta with butter and cheese, eaten with a wooden spoon, often together with dried freshwater fish. For dessert there's miasca, a cake made of cornmeal and dried fruit, and pan meino, small biscuits flavoured with elderflower.

Day 2, morning: Villa Melzi d'Eril

Begin the second day with the walk southward along the lake to Villa Melzi d'Eril at Loppia. The villa was built in 1808–1815 by the architect Giocondo Albertolli for Francesco Melzi d'Eril, Duke of Lodi, who was Napoleon's vice-president in the Italian Republic. It was Melzi's decision to make Bellagio his summer residence that drew Milan's nobility here and transformed the headland into a society resort. Emperor Francis I of Austria visited Bellagio in 1816 and returned in 1825.

The villa was decorated by the foremost artists of the time, among them the painters Appiani and Bossi and the sculptor Canova. The garden, laid out in the English style, stretches along the shore, with camellia hedges, azaleas, rhododendrons and old trees. Here there is also a Venetian gondola that was brought here for Napoleon, as well as Egyptian statues. The villa, chapel and greenhouse together form a neoclassical whole. Melzi competed in art collecting with his neighbour Giovan Battista Sommariva, the owner of Villa Carlotta on the other side of the lake.

Day 2, afternoon: across the lake

Lake Como is best experienced from the water. The car ferries from Bellagio to Varenna on the eastern shore and to Cadenabbia on the western shore take under a quarter of an hour. From Cadenabbia it is a short distance to Villa Carlotta in Tremezzo, and the fast boats go all the way to Como with stops in the towns along the lake. It was also by boat that Bellagio once became famous: in 1838 Emperor Ferdinand I and Metternich came here from Varenna with the Lario, the first steamboat on the lake, launched in 1826.

For those who would rather have a challenge, you can cycle up to Madonna del Ghisallo, the church of the cyclists' patron saint. The climb from Bellagio is around four kilometres with a 500-metre difference in altitude.

Romantics and Bellagio

Franz Liszt and Marie d'Agoult spent four months in Bellagio in 1837, and it was here that Liszt wrote piano pieces that became part of Album d'un voyageur. Gustave Flaubert came in 1845 and wrote in his travel diary that one could live and die here. Luchino Visconti filmed a scene in Rocco and His Brothers in 1960 on the lakeside promenade. The mild winter also has its explanation: the daytime temperature rarely drops below six–seven degrees, and in summer the afternoons are cooled by breva, the lake breeze.

Bellagio through the years

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Further west, on the Italian Riviera, we spend a perfect day in Sanremo, and more lakes, coasts and cities can be found among Metro Mode's destinations.

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