Thursday, November 03, 2016

Lake Garda and the town of Malcesine

The three great mountain lakes in Northern Italy are Lake Maggiore, Lake Como and Lake Garda going from west to east.  We decided to visit Lake Garda simply because it was on our way to Venice.  It turned out to be a very interesting choice.  The lake is quite long and narrow and the town of Malcesine is about half way up on the eastern shore.

Our hotel was about 2 km from the town center but there was a lovely walkway along the lake shore that you could take to the center.  That was great.  You will note that the town is long and thin because the mountain is right there.  There is a gondola ride that goes up it and every afternoon we saw para-gliders.

Looking across the lake you can see the buildings from the little towns on the other side.


The town center itself was BUSY!  We had lunch there but didn't want to stay.  The thing we didn't realize before we came here was that many of the tourists visiting were from Germany or Austria.  I think there were three German networks and two Austrian on the television feed; we had BBC World News.  When we were downtown every other car had German license plates.  It was kind of different.  One of the other reasons the town center was so crowded is because there are ferries carrying people up and down the lake.  The tourists are let off in the center of town, they wander around a bit then go back to the town where they are staying.  

Our hotel was quiet, perhaps because we were on the back side and we had a balcony!  You can see also how the mountain raises up with little shore line for building.

Given that we had a balcony and given that there was a little grocery store right across the street we couldn't help but have a picnic dinner out on the balcony.  Tough life but someone has to do it!



There was one thing I'd never seen before in the little store across the street.  Taps where the customer could get a plastic container and help themselves to wine.  Not bad!
My kind of grocery store!  And it was only 1.80 euro a liter.  Somehow I don't think Safeway is going to pick up on this marketing ploy. 

We are almost back to Venice.  Another stop in the town of Vicenza then off to Venice.  Thanks for coming along.  Take care.

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