Day 17: September 10, 1999
Bellagio, Italy with boat tour of Lake Como

In the morning, we were to meet the boat at 10am for the tour.

Guest house window Italian villa

Italian Villa on Lake Como

It was led by an old Italian man named Mario who didn't speak English. He chatted in Italian as we passed various landmarks. There were about 12 of us, mostly Americans, and we fit in the small boat comfortably. Our first stop was a villa on one of the peaks with impeccable gardens and a nicely maintained set of yellow houses and guest quarters. While we wandered around the grounds, an older couple came up in a boat and was met by a young Italian woman who gave them a personal tour. As I wandered around more, I met with another such couple. I guess this is a common spot for rich tourists. We spent about 20 minutes there and I shot about a roll of film (not sure any will come out that well). As the boat arrived, I went to the bathroom and it turned out everyone just got on the boat and then sat around waiting for me to be done. Oops.

Town on Lake Como

We then wandered along the west coast of the lake as Mario pointed out various other villas and other landmarks. The coastline was very nice. Eventually, we docked at a small island just across the way from one of the towns. He seemed to think there was something worth seeing there, so off we walked. After about 5 minutes, we came to a very old church that was mainly ruins but had the bulk of the main building in tact.

Ancient Church ruins, Island on Lake Como

I took a few shots with the pretty town in the background and the ruins in the foreground - I have high hopes for those. (I just wish I'd had my tripod, though.) We wandered around the ruins, Walendo happy in the ancient surroundings. I don't remember when the church was built, but it was attacked in the 1200s when it suffered damage. We got back on the boat and then went around the other side of the peninsula that Bellagio is on. Mario seemed to be pointing out the cliff that went straight up from the water, so we figured that was considered worth looking at. We then checked out the town on the other side and then finally headed back. On the way back, Walendo met a guy from Sacramento who had an Iridium phone along with all the other gadgets. Walendo had a good time talking with him, getting his geek fix. All in all, it was a nice tour, and gave us a look at some things we wouldn't have seen just wandering around on our own. Walendo was feeling especially connected on the boat, it felt good.

Walendo waiting for Ellen, with FRS radio

When we got back to town, we walked around a bit, and W found a crystal German Shepherd that he thought his Mom would like (even though she's said she doesn't want any more stuff). It was expensive, so I suggested W think about it for a bit before buying it. We decided to go to Bilacus for lunch, since we couldn't get in for dinner. We decided to be adventurous and try other things, but nothing was as good as what we'd gotten the night before, so that was a bit of a disappointment. Still, the environment was still lovely and we enjoyed it.

Walendo: We wandered around some more, noting that Bellagio is more Older-American touristy than the other places we've been. More people speak English, and it just seems older. I got some gelato, and then we went back to the crystal store where he bought the shepherd for his mom. By this time, I was starting to feel run down as I was getting his bug, so I needed to take a nap. While I slept, W sat outside the Du Lac and read and wrote postcards. Later I joined him and typed in the Clio about the trip.

At dinner time, we again wanted to find a pizzeria for a lighter dinner since neither of us was very hungry. I wanted to take a bit of a walk since it was nice out and we weren't in a rush. Walendo grumbled a bit, but came along. We found some stairs up that vanished into the moonlight, so we took them. They kept going, and they were surrounded by a tall wall on all sides, so we couldn't see where we were heading. Eventually, we came out at Pescallo, the town on the other side of the peninsula (which we had seen from the boat). It had a much more real feel, with real apartments and so on. We found one nice outdoor restaurant, and insulted them by asking if they served pizza. We kept walking and found a road that seemed to head back of town. Walendo: To keep my mind off the uphill road, Ellen spouted off about Henry VIII, about whom she's reading. At dusk, we came to a beautiful cemetery. It was well maintained, and there lanterns and candles glowing on most of the graves. Fresh flowers and such were abundant. It was really nice. We walked around reading the gravestones as best we could. One was in English, about a guy who had saved his older brother from "danger of drowning" in the 1800s. Apparently, he died in the attempt, thought that wasn't made clear. We continued on and eventually found ourselves back at the stairs from the other direction, a nice little diversion, I had to admit. We found a pizzeria called La Grotta. Here, Ellen had a funghi pizza, and I had a frutte de mare pizza, which I hoped would be shrimpy. The woman, who claimed to know English, couldn't explain frutte de mare so it ended being mussles and octopi and shit like that. Prosciutto and Funghi remains the optimial pizza. (Ellen: There were a few shrimp still in their shells, so I had to deshell them for Walendo, since he was too bummed to do it. Sheesh.) After a fine dinner, we headed back to the hotel and went to sleep.

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