Italian Holiday Pt. 2 - Lago D'Orta

The Italians have a great word: contorni. Translated literally it means "contours," but in daily life it is used to designate the side-dish category in the carefully orchestrated script that is the Italian meal. And a contorno was precisely what our visit to Lago D'Orta was supposed to be: a nice little side-dish between the rustic primo of Lago Maggiore and the refined secondo of Lago di Como. Unfortunately what it turned out to be was more of a buffo, only the joke was on us. It did, however, spark us to get to Lake Como a day earlier than planned, which turned out to be perfect. Let me explain.

The Isola San Guilio on Lago D'Orta


There are seven lakes in the Italian Lake region, of which Lake Orta is the westernmost and one of the smallest. Our guidebook (The Rough Guide to The Italian Lakes -- it's great, totally recommend it!) just raved about the amazing medieval village of Orta San Guilio, so we decided to spend two days in the middle of our trip checking it out. We had reservations at a (supposedly) charming boutique hotel with a lakeview room, complete with balcony. Perfetto, si? Not so much. The Hotel Giardinetto, or the Garden Ghetto as we have not-so-affectionately come to call it, was a travashamockery of a 3 Star Italian Lake Hotel.

Troy and I have stayed in all kinds of accommodations in various parts of the globe, from hostels to five star hotels. We are not fancy, stuck-up people, but we have a simple baseline: Cleanliness. And, yes my friends, the Hotel Garden Ghetto failed that one. Cheap furniture. Dirty linens. Mold. You get the idea. And, to add insult to injury, it was not even located in the amazing medieval village, but rather in some characterless wide-spot in the road a few kilometers to the north. So how did we come to stay in such a place? One word: Marketing. You have to get up pretty early in the morning to fool me on such things, but as Troy put it, the clever marketing team of the Garden Ghetto must not even have gone to bed.

So, after one restless night and a terrible breakfast, (I mean, isn't that just sad? Food is like an Olympic sport for Italians) we got the heck out of Dodge (as my father would say). Luckily, our hotel on Lake Como was able to accommodate us one night earlier, so we changed our plans. However, before setting out for Menaggio, we spent several hours in the amazing medieval village of Orta San Guilio. To be fair, it was pretty amazing.

A municipal building in Orta San Guilio

There are tons of really cool, modern art sculptures as public art pieces throughout the town

The lakefront is quite charming

Old buildings, modern art, really cool city

Even so, now you've seen it. So, save yourself the trouble and just go to Lago Maggiore and Lago di Como. There is more than enough natural beauty, architectural interest, and history to fill you up.

Click Here - Lago D'Orta Photo Album

Up next (maybe) is the final installment of Italian Holiday: Lake Como Plus! The maybe is due to the fact that we are headed to Ireland tomorrow, and though we usually blog in chronological order, you just never know...