First class all the way
It’s easy to see why George Clooney fell in love with the beauty of Lake Como
BY MARK PALMER
ALONE sculler glides over the calming waters of Lake Como. It would be wonderful to be out there with him so early in the morning, I tell myself, before hopping back into bed and inhaling the gentle scent from a huge magnolia tree outside our window.
How easy it is to be full of good intentions in a place such as this.
Take breakfast, here at the fabulous Villa d’Este hotel, once the lakeside palace of a cardinal clearly not averse to earthly pleasures. There’s a huge table of fresh fruits and yoghurt, but just opposite it, crispy bacon, sausages, fried tomatoes, hash browns and eggs of every choice wait to take advantage of the weakwilled (me) or plain greedy (me again).
But it’s the dignity of this great establishment that eventually comes to one’s rescue. Indeed, there’s something so effortlessly sophisticated and civilised about the whole of Lake Como that the riff-raff are kept firmly in check. As one member of the Villa d’Este staff put it candidly: ‘Even the Russians behave themselves when they come here.’ Lake Como exudes class — but not in a social hierarchical sort of way.
The classiness of this pocket of northern Italy, which Wordsworth described as a ‘treasure which the earth keeps to itself ’, comes from the unspoilt little villages that hug the shore, the beautiful villas in their lush, green gardens, the mountainous hinterland (snow- capped even in late spring) and the well- dressed, courteous locals who seem to measure progress by how much things remain the same.
Como itself (population 80,000) is regarded as the silk capital of the world. It sits proudly at one end of the lake and is built around its magnificent duomo, regarded as one of the best examples of what clumsily has been called ‘Gothic Renaissance Fusion’.
In summer, it’s also a perfect spot to shelter from the heat.
Two or three miles up on the west side of the lake is Cernobbio, a confident little place whose shops don’t bother to open on Monday mornings.
Villa d’Este is just outside town heading north. It’s one of those grand hotels where all the usual suspects have slipped between the crisp linen sheets: Bellini, Rossini, Verdi, Puccini. Alfred Hitchcock said it was his favourite place in the world.
WE DROPPED our bags, drained some prosecco and then headed off on a 60- minute boat trip. This is the single most important thing to do on Lake Como, and it helps if your skipper has a penchant for name- dropping. Ours — a tomboy and former competitive waterskier — was a proper gossip, her tour far more Hello! than Architectural Digest.
‘So on the left we have the villa belonging to George Clooney and we always know when he’s here because the paparazzi sit on that wall,’ she says, pointing at a small marina next to the two houses and expansive gardens that the actor bought after falling in love with Como while filming Ocean’s Twelve in 2004.
‘This one belongs to Silvio Berlusconi,’ she says as we cross to the other side. ‘He bought it last year, but we have not seen much of him.’ And not much of his bunga-bunga parties either, presumably.
Back at Villa d’Este, you are asked to wear a jacket and tie at night in the main restaurant, which is only fair when the waiters (some of whom have been employed at the hotel for nearly 40 years) wear immaculate cream jackets and bow-ties. Service is impec- cable, the food far from stuffy — but my goodness it’s expensive.
Unless you’re Silvio or George, this is treat territory.
There are plenty of other dining options nearby. We go high up to Gatto Nerro, where the views are better than the food, and in Cernobbio we love Harry’s Bar (no relation to the Venice one), where my wife says her lasagne is the best ever.
She likes it so much she wants to go back for lunch the next day, but we are under instructions to visit Bellagio, the outrageously pretty town where the three forks of the lake meet. We aren’t exactly under instructions, but a friend had said a hotel and restaurant called La Pergola in a hamlet nearby is his favourite spot. And, yes, it is rather lovely, although the food, especially the local dish of perch and rice, is hardly worth a detour.
After lunch, we ask La Pergola’s owner if he can summon a taxi to take us back into Bellagio — and he immediately ushers us into his battered Fiat. Nice touch.
In fact, one of the joys of Lake Como is that, despite its obvious attractions to tourists, it never feels like a tourist trap. There are normal shops going about their business. I know this is true because I buy a pair of shoes for the first time in years after working out I’d pay far more for something similar back home.
We take the public ferry back to Como from Bellagio, an unhurried hour’s trip, during which we are joined by children, backpackers and a group of garrulous OAPs on a day out.
Two nights at Villa d’Este is followed by one at the glitzy Casta Diva on the opposite side of the lake. At one point, the building was owned by Giuditta Pasta, the opera singer, which explains why opera is played throughout the day in all the public rooms.
There’s a gorgeous spa built in the rocks near the floating swimming pool. We opt for a 90-minute massage shortly before heading back to the airport — a mood-changer of such proportions that we are tempted to say: ‘Forget it. We’re going nowhere.’