Lake Como!!

May 7, 2011:
I am back in the hostel after a long day on a tour to Lake Como! I walked across Milan this morning to meet my tour group for a nine hour tour to Lake Como and Bellagio.  I was stoked to find that on the bus was a couple from Florida/Georgia (they lived close to the border, one in each state...cutest people ever!!), a man from Pennsylvania living in Germany, a woman from New York, a man from Australia and in the seat behind me a girl from DENVER!!  It was a nice break from the hectic city to take a tour to the lake with people who speak English and one who could chat with me about Denver.  Anyway, the tour bus left Milan around 9am and arrived in Como about 45 minutes later.  We were given a brief tour of the city from the bus, shown the Duomo di Como and then given an hour to roam around the city.  Luckily we arrived on market day and were able to walk through browsing the stalls full of everything from cheese and wine to underwear.  After about an hour we met back at the pier to board our ferry boat to Bellagio.  The ferry makes several stops along the way so the trip took around two hours.  It was nice, I spent the time getting to know my fellow tour members and eating Italian pizza.  The view from the boat was beautiful...and we passed George Clooney's villa which was also beautiful...not as beautiful as it could have been had he actually been standing outside.  Bellagio was stunning, a quiet sleepy town full of shops selling gelato and silk; the townies moving at a much slower pace than the crazy people in Milan.  After a short ferry ride from Bellagio to a town across the lake, we boarded the bus again and headed back to Milan.  It was a great day!! I finished the night by drinking Lemoncello  in my hostel room out of a water bottle with my bunkmates from Canada...those Canadians, so friendly!!! :)