Lake Como is an hour north of Milan and easy to get wrong. The villa you crossed the water for wants a booking you have not made. The river you came to photograph is dry by November. The Palio you built an August trip around has moved to June.
So here is the wishbone-shaped lake with the operating facts attached: what opens in this corner of Italy, what it costs, and which month it exists in.
1. Take the markets in the right order
Como’s antiques and collectibles market takes over the walls along Viale Cesare Battisti on the third Sunday of the month, with about 100 stalls of bronzes, glassware, ceramics and coins. It skips August and December. That catches people out. On the first Sunday the craft and antiques market fills Piazza San Fedele instead, and on the second and fourth Sundays there is a smaller craft market in Piazza Verdi.
2. Visit Como Cathedral
Inside are the tapestries, the frescoes and the Pala Raimondi. You can walk the naves free; the ticket adds the transept, the wooden choir, the sacristies and the upper walkways, and the money goes to restoration rather than to the state.
Cattedrale di Como, Via Maestri Comacini 6, 22100 Como. Open Monday to Friday 10:30 to 17:30, Saturday 10:45 to 16:30, Sunday 11:00 to 11:45 and 13:00 to 16:30. www.cattedraledicomo.it
3. Taste the oil at Lenno
The Vanini family have been milling olive oil at Lenno since 1850 and took a gold medal at the Paris Expo of 1905 for it. The mill still presses other growers’ olives at harvest. It sells its own oil, honey and cosmetics from the shop. This is the far end of the lake’s olive country, so taste before you buy.
Oleificio Vanini Osvaldo, Via Silvio Pellico 10, Lenno, Tel. 0344 55127, www.oliovanini.eu
4. Ride the funicular to Brunate
Inaugurated in 1894 and still how you get up there, the funicular climbs to Brunate at 715 metres in 7 minutes. It costs €3.60 one way and €7.20 return, runs from 06:00 to midnight, and stops at Carescione if you ask. ATM operates it, so check a regional pass first.
Funicolare Como-Brunate, Piazza Alcide De Gasperi 4, Como, www.atm.it
5. Give Varenna a whole day
Castello di Vezio stands above the village in one of the northernmost olive groves in the world, with underground chambers, a furnished tower, a botanical garden and a permanent exhibit on the Lariosauro. It opens daily from 1 March to 1 December, and at weekends and on holidays in good weather the rest of the year. The falconry that used to be its draw was permanently suspended after vandalism in October 2022, so do not go for the birds. Go on a Friday or Saturday evening between June and September and book the terrace aperitivo instead.
Below, Villa Cipressi opens its botanical garden to visitors who book ahead. South of the village runs Fiumelatte, 250 metres long and one of the shortest rivers in Italy, named for the milky white of its water in flood. It exists between the end of March and October, and not otherwise. Leonardo da Vinci wrote it down as the Fiumelaccio in the Codex Atlanticus. That is reason enough to walk the 20 minutes from the village along the Greenway dei Patriarchi, and the 10 more up the mule track to the source.
Castello di Vezio, Via al Castello, 23828 Perledo, Tel. +39 333 4485975, www.castellodivezio.it. Villa Cipressi, Varenna, Tel. +39 0341 830113.
6. Call on the monks at Piona
The Cistercians sit on a wooded spit at the northern end of the lake, and they sell what they make. The church, cloister and chapter room open 08:00 to 12:00 and 14:00 to 18:30, and the grounds from 07:00 to 19:00. Time it around the shop rather than the other way round.
Abbazia di Piona, Via Abbazia di Piona 55, 23823 Colico, Tel. 0341 940331, www.cistercensi.info/piona
7. Book Villa del Balbianello properly
The one on the promontory at Lenno. Guido Monzino bought it in 1974 and left it to FAI when he died in 1988. The interiors are an explorer’s house rather than a nobleman’s: the largest Inuit ivory collection outside Greenland shares a room with objects from his North Pole expedition of 1971.
The park alone is €15, the guided villa tour with the park is €25, booking is obligatory and each tour takes 16 people. The Greenway del Lago runs from Colonno to Griante through Sala Comacina, Ossuccio, Lenno, Mezzegra and Tremezzo. Walk in along it and you arrive having earned the terrace.
Villa del Balbianello, Via Guido Monzino 1, Tremezzina, Tel. 0344 56110, fondoambiente.it
8. Then cross to Villa Carlotta
Built at the end of the seventeenth century by the Clerici marquises of Milan, Villa Carlotta is the art one. Canova, Hayez and Thorvaldsen inside, and the apartments of Princess Charlotte of Sachsen-Meiningen. It opens 10:00 to 19:00 with the last ticket at 18:00, so an afternoon after Balbianello works.
Villa Carlotta, Tremezzo, Tremezzina, Tel. 0344 40405, www.villacarlotta.it
9. Time it for the Palio del Baradello
Como turns medieval for the Palio. It recalls March 1159 and the reception the city gave the emperor Frederick Barbarossa. Note the change: it has moved out of August. The 45th edition ran its Gran Corteo Storico on Saturday 27 June 2026 from 19:30, from Viale Cattaneo down to the Giardini a Lago, with the encampment opening at 10:00. Brienno took it, and the boat race, the gara delle lucie, was called off because of traffic on the water.
Palio del Baradello, Como, www.paliodelbaradello.it
10. Do the ferry triangle, and swim at the end of it
Navigazione Laghi runs the central triangle between Bellagio, Varenna, Menaggio and Cadenabbia. It is the way to see three villages in a day. NaviTap takes contactless cards, so you no longer queue at a kiosk.
Finish at Menaggio. The Lido has a sandy beach, a pool, sun loungers, a children’s area, a bar and restaurant, showers and changing rooms. If you would rather not pay for any of that, Spiaggia Lerai north of the centre is free pebble beach with kayak hire.
Navigazione Laghi, www.navigazionelaghi.it
Related: More Luxos travel guides for the rest of the region.
Two seasons decide this trip. Fiumelatte runs from the end of March to October, and Castello di Vezio opens daily from 1 March to 1 December. Everything else on the list runs year-round. A November visit is a good one, as long as you know what you are giving up.