Lake Como was like a dream. I drove up with my dear friend, Giacomo (my language partner while studying abroad in Florence), and we spent a few days visiting the tiny lakeside towns.
Bellagio is perfectly named (together bello and agio mean something like "beautiful ease"). It's called the "pearl" of the lake towns because of its nicer shops and hotels, but I thought it was a pearl on its own. We stayed away from the shops and went exploring. We mistakenly walked to the other side of town and took our first Lake Como swim among ducks and boats. Everywhere we went, we walked along narrow streets with quaint, colorful buildings. Small-town charm seemed to follow us everywhere and that was just the way we liked it.
