Trip Recap: Lake Como, Italy

Hi friends! We recently got back from our trip to Italy and Croatia. This was my first time going to Europe and I’m so excited to share how it went! I’m sharing about Italy in this post but stay tuned for my Croatia blog post later! The trip was an absolute dream!

Lake Como

After landing in Milan, we got our rental car and drove to our Airbnb in Lake Como. My husband found the best little gem of an Airbnb in Lake Como! Funny enough, we were across the lake from George Clooney’s home. The terrace of the Airbnb is what sold us. We got a panoramic view of the lake. In the early part of our trip we had a few on and off rain showers, so we took that time to relax at the Airbnb and just enjoy the view and drink wine. There was a grocery store right by our airbnb and the owner made homemade lasagna for sale. It was SO delicious!

Villa Melzi & Bellagio

When the rain cleared, we visited Villa Melzi Garden in the afternoon. It was so refreshing to walk there with all the beautiful nature views! Villa Melzi is within walking distance to the popular town of Bellagio, so you can actually do both on the same day. If you purchase the tickets to the garden you can keep the tickets and visit Bellagio, and then show the tickets when you walk back to the garden to get to your car. It just depends where you park! We parked at one of the entrances to Villa Melzi so that’s what we did.

I’m a flower lover so I loved seeing all the flowers in the garden and even just past it where you can see pansies and roses before getting to Bellagio. Once we got to Bellagio, we walked around a bit and got pizza for a late lunch. It’s hard to beat Italian pizza! They use the best ingredients! To end the day, it was to our surprise that across the lake they were having a fireworks show. It was such a nice way to end the day 🙂

Villa Del Balbianello in Lenno

We also visited the town of Lenno in Lake Como, which is where you can tour the famous Villa Del Balbianello. This was definitely on the top of my list for Lake Como! This might have been one of my favorite days. We got up early to catch the ferry that was close to our Airbnb. One thing that made it really hard was all the flight of stairs to get to the ferry port. I have to brag about my husband here because he folded down the stroller and carried it all the way down and also carried it up when we got back. Our boy loved the ferry ride! The nice breeze and gorgeous views made it so fun! I highly recommend going on a ferry at least once if you visit Lake Como! It’s part of the experience:)

When we got there, we realized we should have booked tickets in advance for Villa Balbianello because the line was pretty long. Rookie mistake! This place is popular so don’t make the same mistake I did if you visit. But we finally got in and it was so worth it! Villa Del Balbianello was even featured in a few movies. I was loving all the gorgeous flowers in the garden-hydrangeas, poppies, wisteria, geraniums-it was a dream!