You know you’ve had a good (and busy) vacation when you almost forget your pictures from the couple of days spent driving around Lake Como.

Lake Como, in the Lakes Region of northern Italy,  is the lake of the rich and famous — with villas owned by folks like Richard Branson and Madonna and George Clooney.  In that sense, it’s not really my kind of place, but the fact that it was also the home of a James Bond villain redeems the place entirely.  More important, the whole lake is a beautiful place.  Imagine Colorado-ish mountains surrounding a huge blue lake, then dot the hillsides with pastel-colored villas and villages.  Unfortunately the weather was pretty hazy when I was there, spoiling most of the across-the-lake shots.  None of these pictures do the place justice, but hopefully you can get a sense of the place.

My first visit to Lake Como was about 20 years ago, and one of the lasting memories was driving the ridiculously-narrow roads out to Bellagio, which sits at the axis of the Y-shaped lake.  I apparently didn’t learn my lesson, and again had roughly 100 occasions where I just had to cringe and hope I didn’t loose a side mirror as I passed other cars.   That trip to Bellagio was before the folks in Las Vegas made the word “Bellagio” so famous in America.  That’s the town of Bellagio in that wide panarama shot, taken from a car ferry that cuts across the lake.