Huh? Wha? Where am I? It took me a few minutes this morning to remember where we were. I got out of bed, went over to the window, and opened the curtain to see beautiful Lake Como, sparkling in the early morning light. Oh yeah, NOW I remember! It’s our first day waking up in Bellagio.
Yesterday was a big travel day. After traveling for 20-something hours, we arrived at Bellagio, settled in, had a great dinner, conked out, and slept like babies. No signs of jet lag this morning.
Outside, the sun was coming up behind us, shining on the mountains on the other side of the lake. It was early, but there was already activity on the water. Car ferries like the one that brought us here yesterday were on the move. A few other boats, too. Their wakes stayed in place for a long time on the calm water.
Tomorrow we’re going to take the train to Milan, just for the day. The nearest train station is in Varenna. It’s supposed to be a 20-minute boat ride away. So today, our plan is to make sure we know how to get to Varenna, find the train station, and get back to Bellagio.
It’s Coffee Time!
But first, it’s coffee time! I got cleaned up and went downstairs to the hotel’s breakfast room. One good thing about Italy – you’re never far away from a really good cup of coffee.
I found the breakfast room and poked my head inside. It looked pretty nice. There were 10-15 small tables. A few people were already having breakfast. There was an American-looking coffee station – two well-used “Bunn-style” glass coffee pots sitting on a couple of burners. I thought to myself, “We’re in Italy. What are THOSE doing here?”
A young guy was standing in an opening behind the Bunns. He was manning one of those huge Italian espresso machines. He saw me looking at the coffee on the burners. I looked at him. He looked at me. He scrunched up his nose and made a face. “Non lo vuoi.” (“You don’t want that”), he said in facial sign language.
Then he said, “Fatto qualcosa per Lei. Che prenda?” (“I’ll make something for you. What would you like?”). I don’t really remember whether he said it in english or italian – it was early.
Un Macchiato, per Favore
My italiano wasn’t up to speed yet, but I said, “Prendo un macchiato, per favore.” Why did I order a caffè macchiato? I never get them at home. It was the first thing that entered my mind, and I didn’t want to appear to have to work too hard to be able to answer a simple question.
If I had taken the time to think about it, my thought process would have been… “Let’s see… a ‘caffè’ is a tiny cup of espresso. A ‘caffè latte’ is a little coffee with a lot of hot milk. A ‘cappuccino’ is more coffee with a little hot milk. A ‘macchiato’ is an espresso with steamed milk on top. A ‘latte macchiato’ is steamed milk with a little espresso.” Leave it to the Italians to take a simple thing like coffee and turn it into a gastronomic art form.
It was way too early to be thinking that hard, so I just said whatever popped into my head, which was “macchiato.” I guess it was a good answer, because the guy seemed pleased. He went right to work at his gigantic copper-colored espresso machine.
Speaking of gastronomic art forms, when he finished making the macchiato and handed it to me, it WAS like a little work of art. “Che bella!” — It was beautiful! I took it back to the room, being careful not to spill it or mess it up, guarding it like it was a precious jewel that I’d found.
How to Get to Varenna?
It was a good thing I had that coffee – I had some serious work to do. My first assignment: figure out how and where to catch a boat to Varenna. Catching a boat would be no problem. Catching one that was actually going where we wanted to go would be more difficult.
I’d picked up a boat schedule yesterday, but I hadn’t opened it yet. Now it was time to give it a look. Whoa. There was a ton of information in there, all in italiano. The schedule has all you need to know about where and when boats arrive and depart, and where they go. All the data is there, but being able to decipher it is another matter.
Things got complicated quickly. Batellos, (people ferries), autotraghettos, (car ferries), and Servizio Rapido, (hydrofoils) each had their own schedule. There are LOTS of little towns on Lake Como. (Who knew?) Routes vary for each service and from town to town. Mamma mia. I should have ordered a double macchiato.
The only way I could see to get to Varenna early enough to catch the train was to take an autotragehetto that stopped at Menaggio first. Even though Menaggio is on the other side of the lake, this is the boat that would get us to Varenna in time for the train.
OK. Here We Go…
We left the hotel and walked across the street to where boat tickets are sold. We walked up to the window. A young girl greeted us. It seemed like English isn’t spoken much here, so I had prepared myself for requesting tickets in italian.
“Buon giorno,” I said. “Due biglietti pour domani, per il autotraghetto a Varenna alle otto e quarto.” (“Two tickets to go on the car ferry to Varenna tomorrow at 8:15 AM.”)
She just looked at me and smiled, as if to pity this poor, lost soul.
To be continued…
