Overnight to Italy; Arrival in Stresa

 Stresa, October 6

Sometimes everything goes right!  We can hardly hope for that these days, but our trip to the north of Italy has started well.  Our digital EU COVID passports arrived with no problem, our COVID tests returned negative in 24 hours, and despite having to get to JFK via Detroit, all the planes were on time, all our paperwork to travel to Italy was in order, and there was no hassle.  Our luggage arrived with us.

 We were met by our Smithsonian guide who said we are the second group she has traveled with in the past 18 months; the first was last week.  We will be 13 people of whom 11 are here now, all just a little tired from the overnight trip to Milan, so no idea of the personalities yet.  We drove an hour north of Milan into the Lake District, which is made up of a series of glacial lakes very much like the Finger Lakes.  New York, however, does not have the Alps as a background.  Lake Maggiore is mostly in Italy, but the north end of it is in Switzerland. 

 As we began our drive along the western side of the lake we came upon the Borromeo Fortress across the lake, which was completed in the 13th or 14th century.

 

 See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocca_Borromeo_di_Angera   We continued north along the west side of the lake:

 

We reached the town of Stresa where we’ll be staying for the next week, and checked into our hotel.  Here’s a view from our hotel room looking out over our balcony.  The weather is glorious, temperatures in the mid-high 60s, brilliant sunshine and low humidity.

 

While Joyce took a nap, I went for a walk.  There’s a broad brick path along the lake which makes for a lovely promenade, and there are small parks and statuary everywhere.  Despite being quite far north, the climate is mild and there are lots of palms here:



  In some places you get peeks of snow-capped Alps:

 


 I wandered into the charming and pedestrian-friendly town and came across the city hall:

 

There were many gelaterias to be sampled over the next few days.

 


 Back to the hotel for a nap and a shower.  We have a welcome cocktail party and dinner tonight.  It’s a promising start to the trip.

Comments

  1. MegOctober 6, 2021 at 5:10 AM

    Excellent! So happy everything went according to plan! Now the fun begins. Looks gorgeous!

    ReplyDelete
  2. xctravelerOctober 6, 2021 at 6:26 AM

    So glad you made it there with minimum stress (or should I say stresa?) Looking forward to your posts.

    Paul

    ReplyDelete
  3. MarciaOctober 6, 2021 at 8:15 AM

    So glad there were no hitches in your travel to Italy. Enjoy!
    Marcia

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ralph P. LockeOctober 7, 2021 at 4:54 PM

    Wow, great that you had no "bumps" on your way to Italy. I hope the sailing remains smooth. Those photos are amazing. (As I imagine was the gelato.)

    ReplyDelete

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