17-Jun-2018:: Lake Como to Lake Garda

We were sad to leave our beautiful location of Bellagio this morning after three fantastic days in the area. The initial journey was again around narrow bendy roads, but certainly the views over the lake were just as stunning as ever.
The drive today was approximately 170kms mostly along what they call here autostrada, which is an easy way for them to charge you extra – Italians are masters at that sort of thing. The drive itself was fairly easy because of the motorway and we reached the outskirts of Sirmione by around 10:30.

As usual, the hotel room was not ready on our arrival, but we decided not to wait around and waste time, so we headed for a walk along the lake to the old historic part of Sirmione. We hadn’t realised, but our hotel was quite a way from the centre of town (approx 4kms), so it ended up being about an hour’s walk. As it was quite warm, we arrived there ready for a cool drink.
Old Sirmione is very different to what we had in Bellagio, Varenna, Menaggio etc in that there weren’t the narrow village streets, rising up from the waters edge with quaint shops and cafes lining either side. The topography here in Garda is very different to what we’ve seen in Como and Maggiore. Here you don’t have the steep hills and mountains which contain the lakes on all sides. Lake Garda (at least in the Sirmione area seems relatively flat). We can see sizeable hills in the distance, but they’ve not close to us.

This topographical difference influences the layout and feel of the city of Sirmione. Whilst cafes, bars, restaurants and souvenir shops abound, they are in wider streets, bigger piazzas and generally more room to move. There is a famous old castle here (Scaligera Castle), which we have only seen from the outside as yet, but is a most imposing sight as you come into old Sirmione.
We spent some time looking through the old town, had some lunch and then took off to the Grottoes of Catullus, a first century BC Roman villa, the ruins of which are still very evident and visible. Surprisingly, it is a large site with many parts of the villa still recognisable.
Catullus was a Roman Poet who had been born into wealth and he used some of that wealth to build the villa. It would have been quite a magnificent construction in its day and is still impressive today, with its fabulous views over the lake, the huge arches, the expansive rooms etc.

By the time we got back in the hotel, it was after 6:00pm, so a quick shower and then off to somewhere for dinner.