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| The view during our drive along the lake of Lugano. |
Our stay at Stella D'Italia on the Lake of Lugano
We decided to go snorkeling and our ultimate destination was the island of Elba just off of the coast of Tuscany in Italy. We took our dog Pearl so we wanted to break up the trip into short drives. We drove about 3 hours from the Zurich area to the Italian part of the Lake of Lugano. We drove on the road on the cliff above the lake for about 20 minutes to reach Valsolda. We passed through small villages along the lake and finally arrived at the Stella D’Italia hotel. Our room had a gorgeous view of the lake. The hotel was traditional and beautifully decorated. We ask where our dog was allowed to walk in the hotel and the concierge said “Wherever she wants.”.
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| The view from our room. |
Our immediate concern was to go swimming in the lake. We put our suits on and walked through the grounds to the deck. Only a few people were there laying in the sun. A women was in the outdoor cafe working on a laptop. We thought that she must have been a famous writer staying here to work on a book. She looked very serious so we did not bother her. Even the pictures don’t fully capture the beautiful blue color of the clear lake water framed by mountains and by arbors full of roses and bougainvillea. After a time a family of ducks rested under the deck chairs. When they went back into the water they marched over several feet to the ladder as they had seen the hotel patrons do and jumped into the water from there. There were also swans further away near where the water transit boat stopped to take people on tours of the lake or to other towns.
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| View from the hotel grounds and dining area. |
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| Looking up at the dining area rose arbor. |
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| The hundred year old rose bush - Belciana rose. |
We had a long dinner that night under the rose arbor. It was a large structure covered by several very large rose bushes that were said to have been around 100 years old. Each rose plant was as large as a small tree. The view was breathtaking. The appetizer of melon and prosciutto had a surprising addition of burrata cheese. It was a creamy fresh mozzarella-like cheese that was so good we bought several while still in Italy to take back to Switzerland. We ordered an entire bottle of prosecco to share -- grateful for the gentle prices after drinking 20 dollar glasses of wine in Switzerland with insanely expensive and unremarkable Italian food at our small neighborhood restaurants.
We had also walked our dog Pearl along a brick path that follows a mountain stream and another time up stone stairs that go to a church and then beyond. We left the next morning to drive through the piedmont to the coast of Italy near Piombino where the ferry goes to Elba.
