The Lago Maggiore is, despite what its name appears to suggest, not the largest body of water in the Italian “Lake District” (that honour goes to Lake Garda), but it is the most stretched-out. The shortest route around it is 170 km long, and more than 60 km lie between Arona in the south and…
Piacenza, says one of my guide books for Northern Italy, is known as the “City of Bricks”, but this, I believe, does not quite hit the mark. It is it true that many buildings in town, including some grand architectural statements of Church and State, have been constructed from that relatively humble material … ……
This is a post, above all, in praise of the Italian town of Lodi near Milan. However, It is also a post in praise of all those other Lodis across the world, unassuming places into which travellers only ever stumble by chance. These places have so much to offer, and travels would be so much…
Sometimes, it is best to know little or nothing about the destination you are about to visit: this allows you to keep the option open of surprising yourself. Sometimes, however, a little knowledge can help – and feel like adding a key ingredient to the sauce that turns a pleasant but bland meal into something…
Most people would classify Sestri Levante as a “tourist town”, but you should not think that this is a good reason for bypassing Sestri on your tour of Northern Italy. First of all, because the tag “tourist town”, although commonly used with more than a hint of contempt, is not, if you think about it,…
In these bleak mid-winter days of sleet, snow and icy winds: what could possibly bring more joy than a trip to a place where you can still feel the breath of summer on your neck, a place where, while the season’s paraphernalia (parasols and pleasure boats) may have been mothballed, the spirit of summer is…
This week, we will serve you another slice of unknown Italy but with a twist to the recipe. While last week’s destination of Udine is, roughly following the famous Donald Rumsfeld classification of unfamiliar objects, very much an “unknown unknown” (think: obscure medieval poets), the city of Brescia is “known-unknown” in the fashion of Edmund…
No country in the world benefits as much (materially) from tourism as Italy – or suffers as much from its consequences. Other countries may attract more visitors, but these visitors are spread out more thinly over a vast territory (the USA), are more concentrated in a few coastal resorts (Mexico), or both (France). In Italy…
Milan is the economic powerhouse of Italy but also the country’s least charming city. Fortunately for visitors, however, Milan is also surrounded by places which – all within an hour or so by rail – represent the best that Italy can offer. For scenic beauty, few parts of the country can rival Lake Como and…
Today’s post deals with a question that I have been wrestling with for quite some time. Why is it so hard to find proper parks in Southern Europe? Why are the green spaces there either overcooked or raw, either overloaded with ornamental features or scruffy and neglected – and why are these spaces often so…
