25th - 31st July 2007.
We liked the idea of camping lakeside but had found the Lake Como experience too weird to stay, so we headed to another lake further east called Lake Garda. Lake Garda is a much bigger lake than Como, and has the most brilliant aqua blue water, similar to the Maldives. It also has the advantage of being close to Verona, a town we had planned to visit after hearing good things about it through fellow travellers and our Lonely Planet guidebook. The southern corner of Lake Garda is the exact opposite of what we look for in a camping location. Crowded, traffic, theme parks, waterslides. We were trying to find a campsite but the full sign was out at most of them. One lady said she had one spot left but it wasn't that nice. She mean't the actual site, but we thought it better described the entire campground. We walked through rows and rows of campers sweltering in the crowded and dusty conditions, some seemed to look at us smugly thinking they had found the best place on earth for a holiday. Sure, we had no home for the night yet but we weren't desperate enough to join these poor misguided fools.
The further we drove away from the south shore the more we liked Lake Garda, but the less frequent the campsites were, and the full signs were still out at all of them. It was getting late, but we had been in this position before and ended up finding some of the better places we had stayed. The hillside was starting to get steeper above the lake, not a good sign when looking for a campground. We drove through a small town called Torri del Benaco that had a few accommodation options if we got desperate, but we had only resorted to non camping accommodation once in eight weeks of touring Europe and we wanted to keep the record intact.
A few minutes out of town we rounded a corner and saw signs for two campgrounds next to each other. We missed the driveway for the first one but saw the second one in time. The manager escorted Mandy to see a site they had vacant and when they returned (finally) she looked out of breathe but excited. We drove up to the back carpark and when I saw the view I knew why she had been excited, and out of breathe. Our campsite was on the highest of 6 terraced levels perched on the side of the hill overlooking Lake Garda. It took us 72 steps to get to our campsite from the bottom. We looked out over the lake and mountains beyond it. We had found our new home.
We spent the next day reading and lazing around our camp and down at the beach. The beach was made up of white and grey rocks and pebbles. We found a quiet area along the beach further, but there is always the option of joining the Italians, swanning around posing to each other and sitting way too close together for our liking. Personal space is a concept they don't seem to understand. Another thing that is way too common is to see couples getting it on, right in front of everyone. GET A ROOM!!! I felt like screaming. Not only at the beach, on the side of roads, at train stations, outside the campground toilets, anywhere.
Friday we drove into Torri del Benaco and walked through the tiny village. We had lunch overlooking the lake and indulged in our first Italian Pizza. Later, we sat on our hill with our candles lit, had beers and breezers and watched the sun go down.
The next day we drove back down the lake and then headed east to the town of Verona, famous as the setting for Romeo and Juliet. We found our way to the main piazza where we soon realised this was a major tourist destination with bus loads of tourists following their tour leaders. We walked through the cobble stone streets, Mandy went shopping again and I patiently waited outside in the 35 + degrees heat. We visited Verona's Colosseum, a smaller version of the one in Rome. There was stage productions on at night inside so the arena was full of seating and the stage. Further on we came across another large piazza and the lure of pizza got to us again
We walked along the river and then wandered aimlessly through the tiny back streets of the town. Where the main streets and piazza's are full of tourists you walk one block away and there's no-one except a few locals. We enjoy seeing the way people live and occasionally talking to the locals in a variety of methods of communication.
The next day we relaxed again around the campsite and down the beach. Today was Sunday and it seemed the whole of Verona comes to Lake Garda for the weekend. It was difficult to find a bit of rock without someone sitting 1 metre away from you.
Monday it was time to leave Lake Garda. We could have easily spent the next 10 days here but it was time to leave and head for the famous Cinque Terre on the Mediterranean coast...
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