Tuesday 1 September
Oddly, both David and I had zooms to attend at 17.00 and 18.00 respectively, so we took a train to Gatwick after an early lunch and were in place in the bedroom of the Hilton in time for David to meet and greet the next WSG Piemonte tour, and me as company secretary to sign off my last FFFA accounts and with John Barlow, to resign as trustees. We followed these with dinner in the Japanese-styled hotel restaurant.
Wednesday 2 September
Annoyingly, the 09.00 Easyjet flight for Milano Malpensa left the North terminal late at 10.30, and we arrived at a very warm Malpensa T2 around 13.00, only to be held for almost an hour in the passport queue, before collecting the forlorn becalmed cases from a stationary conveyor, to catch a brand new train from T2 at 14.15, to Gallarate, and on to Stresa for 15.15.
The Hotel Boston is five minutes from the station! We rested in our spacious modern room, part of a big extension with a very stylish contemporary staircase. The hotel itself felt impersonal if efficient; 24 hour reception and an excellent location one block from the lakeside promenade but with little interaction in the modest public spaces. The coffee machine disappeared early!
We walked along the promenade in the very warm sunshine, with a clear sky showing the lake at its best, with boats to-ing and fro-ing as we sat with drinks in a lakeside cafe, before an excellent supper outside in the Osteria Mercatore at 20.00
Thursday 3 September
We slept in til 09.00; then hurried to catch the modest breakfast before 09.30. A walk to the ticket office of the linea pubblico produced cheap tickets for the round trip to Intra where the car ferry takes cars across the lake. Our passenger boat made slow progress; tourists embark and disembark at every island.
We ate well in the traditional Osteria il Castello at Intra; parmigiana for me; lake fish for David and mosquitoes for us both, before returning by ferry, passing all the islands and stops. I enjoyed a late afternoon rest, Piriton induced, and then supper at the Enoteca Europa in the big eatery square with glasses of Oltre Po Pavese PN sparkling, and a bottle of Trebbiano d’Abruzzo.
Friday 4 September
Bought tickets for the three islands from the small seafront office, and boarded a smaller boat (yellow/blue livery) almost immediately at 10.15 to travel to Isola Madre which is the quietest of the three and whose gardens are remarkable. We began with coffee on the balcony of the only restaurant, before joining a queue to enter the garden, which incorporates nearly all of the island’s eight hectares.
The family Borromeo have owned it since the 1500s; the palazzo was commissioned in 1583, used in the 1940s to protect the Borromeo family’s Milan art collection, and became museum in 1987 now managed by Bavona’s town council.
Having walked through cool avenues amongst white peacocks and pheasants and the odd aviary, we entered the Palazzo at the summit of the site to enjoy the superb views of the lake and mountains, and the ornamental gardens immediately below.
Once inside, there was no way out except through! The family had produced no less than six cardinals in its time and the building was over-endowed with second rate stuff, a repository for the family’s less impressive art and oil-painted selfies – of which the were dozens and dozens of gloomy examples. The Sallotto Veneziano boasted a chandelier from Murano and brilliantly executed trompe d’oeil decoration. All credit to the photographer in the mirror – certainly not me!
The only exception I enjoyed were the late 1600s paintings in La Sala Delle Stagioni whose naivety jarred but which attempted some wider representation of life – albeit idealised.
It felt claustrophobic and I felt dizzy, as well as uncomfortably hot as we hurried through the bedrooms and puppetry toy theatre sections, in order to get outside. These contained the puppets and marionettes created for the extraordinary Marionette Teatro which dates from 1830, designed by La Scala’s own set designer of that time – Alessandro Sanquirico.
Whatever, the gardens were delightful, and now maintained beautifully by the RHS, containing many rare, mature, sub-tropical species of trees and shrubs.
We skipped Isola Superiore (aka I Pescatori), above, planning to eat there on the final evening, and disembarked at Isola Bella, around lunch time. It was very hot, and we took cover in a homely-looking eatery Victoria run by a middle aged woman and her aged mother, who was causing her daughter some concerns. In fact it was a courtyard of a very well appointed formal ristorante, as we discovered when using its loos.
We moved onto the fabulous Palazzo whose very formally laid-out terraces and statuary dominate face south over the lake, visible from the mainland and towering above every boat or ferry that passes.
The entry is managed in the raised small square at the side of the Palazzo, and again the gardens are reached only having snaked through the enormous palace with its huge interior domed room with windows looking out on to every side of the lake, with a decorated cupola not unlike so many Baroque churches but mercifully without religious decorations. The tourist route took us through bedrooms, and walkways, dining and drawing rooms; beautiful fabrics and elegant furniture.
By contrast with the previous Palazzo, this was bright, full of light, elegantly if excessively furnished, and bedecked with the Borromeo’s first-rate stuff. The lower, basement rooms were decorated as grottos, darker, cave-like, that went on and on, until we finally made it out into a baking hot afternoon and the full sun.
The gardens are spectacular; formal, architectural and overly dependent of giant size statuary and visual exaggeration. But there is no gain-saying its effect! And the RHS once gain creating walk ways and plantings of great elegance and beauty.
The ferry brought us back for four o’clock. The proximity of water, jettys, vessels, bird activity adds a wonderful dimension to a holiday!
We rested, showered, and headed up our road to a local ristorante that David had noticed as we walked from the station. We had grilled vegetables to start, and then fish, and manzo tagliata, taking our time before the concert David had researched.
It was part of the Stresa Festivale, in the town’s Congresso hall, an impressive twenty year old performance space, five minutes from our hotel. We misjudged the start time, ( BST v EST!) and as we took our seats on the front row for the second half at c 21.00, we feared we had missed Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. Here our luck held; the concert had begun at 20.00 with the Rachmaninov items, and after short piece which neither of us recognised, the familiar opening bars sounded from the two pianos centre stage. The performers were astonishing (even if the photo is dreadful). Their dexterity, timing, synchronisation and sheer brilliance were breathtaking-taking. Extraordinary.
We had a night cap in a newly opened Cellagrande outlet, trying their 2019 Erbaluce traditional method, and their still 2024, made in only stainless steel. It was outshone by our host donating a glass of an older version of the still wine, held in tonneaux for 12 months.
Saturday 5 September
After a lie-in, we took the ferry to the L’Eremo di Santa Caterina del Sasso at 10.15 which was first built in 1195 into the cliff, as a thank offering by Alberto Besozzi for surviving shipwreck and plague, and which became his hermitage, and where he died in 1210. His body still lies in the space of his original building. The site was occupied by several other eremitic communities who supplemented it over the centuries, and is still served by oblates of St Benedict’s rule.
The modest structure of the original chapel, based on the dimensions of that on Mount Sinai for St Caterina of Alexandria, with its faded frescos and rough stonework emphasises his primitive, simple and very small scale existence, at odds with the message of the now gaudy Baroque church built over it.
Not quite Assisi, if now managed by a Franciscan third order, and served by a newish lift from the car park sited 240 steps up the cliff above. The site attracts both the pious and the tourist. Little remains to remind (or even confront for the first time) the visitor of its original cenobitic purpose, and the corpse of poor old Alberto has the company of hundreds of us every day – whether he’d like it or not!
Today lunch was on the terrace at the Grand Hotel des Iles Borromées; we watched guests arriving for a wedding, and others heading to the lakeside swimming pool via the front path, the zebra crossing and a short walk over the promenade. The food and service were both delightful.
We had a restful afternoon, before packing, and a shower before the evening boat ride (red flag) from small jetty opposite the Skybar to the ristorante Verbana on Isola I Pescatori. Very civilised!
Sunday 6 September
Breakfast and bus from the Station at 09.02 for Orta ! A minibus appeared at 09.08 and we scrambled into what felt like an already full bus with our luggage. In fact there remained four seats, which were filled at the next village by five Americans and an Italian woman. The ticket machine failed; they hadn’t change for a €50 note, and the two men had to travel the 40 minutes standing precariously in the very tight aisle.
I had a sustained intelligent conversation with one of them who had worked in the oil industry in Grimsby and London twenty years ago. He was both subtle and honest if wedded to the ghastly phrase ‘we’ve done…Rome, Florence’ etc. I hadn’t the heart to invite him to use ‘I’ve been to…. ‘ My failure.
We arrived at the bus stop set immediately above the hotel San Rocco itself, and missed its sign and driveway as we wheeled our way down the footpath. No matter; we were in the hotel by 10.30 with the luggage stowed until room 303 was ready. The shoreline is as I remembered; delightful! The water laps at the floating staging serving as an outdoor bar space, the pool lies adjacent, and the view over the lake to the island and to Pelle is magnificent.
We walked through the very crowded main Piazza, past the boats plying to and from the island and the many Sunday trippers, on to the quieter lakeside route which leads to the Hotel Vespi and its busy roundabout. At no point did we attempt the paths to the Sanctuary or its many chapels.
Lunch at the hotel on the terrace comprised only prawns, finely sliced pineapple and a mass of black rice, seriously al dente. David soon experienced a now rare sugar rush and lethargy, while I wondered how my gut would respond…
Once our modest room was available, we moved in, dozed a little, and I swam in the old-fashioned pool whose depth is constant (perhaps 135cm) and temperature c 25deg C, before walking to the enoteca Boeuc – dialect for cow or bullock – to book supper. Beef tartare and bagna cauda. with a bottle of 2018 Petterino from Gattinara; What more could we want?
Monday 7 September
A busy and at 09.00 full breakfast room – indoors oddly – provided a modest choice of vegetables to accompany the usual fare, and the bread (and the tea) was disappointing, but thereafter we took advantage of the glorious decking in the shade of generous umbrellas and canopies and the reasonable quality coffee served at the bar, before booking the ristorante San Antonio on the busy road towards Pettinasco where ate well twice in 2024.
The walk to it along the via Panoramico is civilised, but the day was hot, and the humidity high. The final half a kilometre on the busy road is unpleasant, despite a footpath most of the way.
The food was as good as we remembered, and the view fabulous. This bay serves the camp site and a beach from which all ages set off astride or for the intrepid, atop inflated ‘boards’ armed with only a long handled paddle. A young couple and friend had arrived by small boat, moored just by our table, and their delightfully friendly six month old burbled away happily until they re- boarded the boat and sped away.
Inexplicably, my stomach’s gurgling moved into a more dramatic phase as the meal progressed, and after several visits to the loo I was anxious about the return walk, on this very hot and humid mid afternoon. The problem subsided for the duration of the walk, which followed the lakeside shore around the foot of the Sanctuary hill. We judged this route unsuitable for towing suitcases, should we find ourselves travelling by train to Milan on Wednesday. The route to the station is not an easy or pleasant walk on a hot day, tugging luggage. Our return is not yet booked!
Once in the hotel, the gut revolt calmed, as we cooled down in the bedroom. After very restorative closeness, I went for a swim, before we set off for the Bistrot on the roof of the Michelin-starred ristorante where we had celebrated David’s special birthday two years ago. As the sun faded the lights around the lake set off the subtly illuminated monastery.
Magical (not a word I use much – but mercifully no unicorns)
Tuesday 8 September
An earlier breakfast to avoid the crush, and for me a morning alongside the lapping lake reading Frank Tallis’ Wise: Finding purpose, meaning and wisdom beyond the midpoint of life which is engrossing. It will become my go-to present for anyone over 45… He is very impressive.
Meanwhile David was fighting electronic demons again in an attempt to understand the draining of the laptop’s battery. Claude was doing his bit but it wasn’t resolving easily….
We left soon after 12 to walk to the piers, only to discover the boat to Pelle is far from frequent and we had missed the opportunity to go across the lake for lunch. David cleverly spotted that the larger vessel we shall use the next day to travel to Omegna stops at Pettinasca where we had stayed in 2022, in the apartment Tumas. We passed one of the larger hotels of Pettinasca on the lakeside.
We arrived there shortly before 13.00 and walked towards the village church with its simple restrained exterior (there its elegance stops – inside is all too familiar, fussy baroque) though there is a stand-out statue of young San Domenico Savio, in modernish dress (born in 1854 and an acolyte of Dom Bosco, but died aged 14 of TB, canonised in 1954)
Lunch of hummus and caprese was in the garden of a roadside ristorante catering for all comers, and we took our time strolling around the very small municipio square before returning to the jetty.
It was hot and muggy, and like yesterday, began to rain around 16.00 as clouds and rumbles of thunder descended from the north. The spell was short-lived but presaged the more dramatic break in the weather forecast for Wednesday.
The young man supplying towels for the pool kindly removed the robot (is there more or less risk of electrocution than a lightning strike I wondered as I swam in an empty pool next to the lake?) while David continued to struggle with a conspiracy of technical frustrations which impacted negatively on his holiday mood.
This only began to lift as we walked along the lakeside path before dinner in the hotel’s small but pleasant dining room. Fiano and a glass of Langhe Nebbiolo accompanied a yellow-fin tuna capaccio and another beef tartare, followed by Uruguayan Angus (!) and lobster. The hotel struggles to recruit staff, and relies heavily on a couple of stalwarts.
Wednesday 9 September
This morning we breakfasted early, and vacated the room on the dot of 10.00 and spent a pleasant couple of hours dodging a few drops of rain until collecting the luggage and walking to the pier for the 12.30 boat to Omegna
As it happened, one of David’s contacts in Domodossola, Francesco Stratta, of DEA – agricoltura eroica in Val d’Ossola had emailed on Monday to thank David for his inclusion in the Report, and suggested we visit when next in the vicinity. Having responded to say we were nearby, Francesco encouraged us to head north.
So on Wednesday, we travelled the length of the lake by the 12.30 boat to Omegna, to catch the train, and stay until Saturday, from where we planned to travel by train via Gallarate, to fly from Malpensa. It became clear that Francesco’s intervention had saved us from the Air Traffic Control chaos which broke out across the UK yesterday, resulting in thousands of cancelled flights and planes marooned across Europe. A narrow escape!
We enjoyed the ferry up the lake, arriving with time for lunch at a lakeside bar – massive grilled prawns and salad, before walking for ten minutes to Omegna station. The train to Gallarate was a few minutes late, and the Domodossola train slow as the rain came down heavily. No matter, we arrived in Domodossola on time, and walked for few minutes to the very solid, comfortable Hotel Corona, on the edge of the elegant old town centre. The cheerful man on reception set a confident and cheerful tone, as he asked us about letto matrimonale v due letti I felt my age!
Domodossola lies very close to the Sempione Pass, and the train goes through a vast tunnel to Brig in Switzerland, from where two years ago we took the train to Visp, and bus to Saas Feé to see Jill and Peter.
From our bedroom window we can see the Weissmies mountain (4,017 m) which stands between Saas Fee and Domodossola. It has a glacier at its summit, which gives its white appearance. The name translates to White Moss in the Valais dialect. Rapid climate melting over recent decades has shrunk the summit cap; it has shrunk by seven metres from its official, historical 4,023m.
In the evening we walked around the compact historic centre, assessing the many tourist offerings of bars, trattorie, locande and ristoranti. Several were closed, and as the weather changed, a faintly autumnal feel descended. David was in search of shoes, and acting on advice of the friendly receptionist, and with the help of a helpful assistant we found a pair of brown suede boat/driving shoes in an outlet of an Italian traditional shoe maker, SLZ Colazzo.
La Motta was our supper destination, just visible on the back street shown above with its distinctive traditional homes built over a ground floor working space, and jutting out over the narrow road. I had La linga (tongue) and a tartufo linguine, while David had the gnocchi with a special mountain cheese, and fish. A rustic place, but offering a sole bottle of Diecibrenta, Vallone’s top wine, whose vineyards we hope to visit tomorrow.
David’s frustrations were increased by the evasive Marco Vallone’s lukewarm response to his request to visit, and Francesco’s nomination of Friday late afternoon for our visit. Three nights in Domodossola briefly felt a lost opportunity – although avoiding the ATC fiasco was a real comfort!
The gloom lifted when David’s second, more explanatory email to Marco illicited a google map location for the famous Diecibrenta pergola vineyard which Vallone planned to harvest tomorrow morning, and the suggestion we might join him there. What a relief!
Thursday 10 September
After breakfast the hotel summoned a taxi, and in no time we were weaving our way in a Tesla round the hair pins and scary corners of Via Pello, just south of Masera, which rises from the small plain of Domodossola. Roberto, the padrone of Garrone, this growing wine business, was a quiet, slow-moving presence among a squadra of ten or so friends and locals carefully harvesting the large bunches of the Prünent clone of Nebbiolo from the traditional chestnut pergolas. He greeted us cautiously, before Marco spotted us, parked the van, and came to greet us.
There followed a long explanation and tour of these tiny pockets of vineyards. We also met Mattia, Marco’s younger (but much taller) brother, barely 18 months between them, but not remotely similar! The harvest is almost a month earlier than previous years after this very hot and dry summer, saved by a couple of days of rain mid August. The flowering and fruit set was dry and hot, resulting in high quality grapes with little or no disease. The landscape speaks for itself.
Marco arranged for his father Roberto to take us back to Domodossola, but not before we had visited the working men’s club for coffee (where Roberto added more than a goucha of red wine from a magum produced from under the counter) and to his family’s working premises: cheese production as well as cellars and tasting room, today hosting a busload of tourists, who like us, will also visit the church. An old photo of his bisnonno Maté oversaw the cellar. It was clear that this was a longstanding family concern, and a deep commitment to their village, Oira.
We eventually arrived back in Domodossola, and had a traditional large lunch in Terminus – a classic functional ristorante with probably a hundred covers scattered in different types of spaces.
Having eaten (too) well, we opted for a quiet afternoon and rest having failed to make contact with Eduardo and Silvia Padrone in the hope of perhaps visiting and tasting, as advertised in their shop in town. Instead we called in at Garrone’s sophisticated enoteca where we tasted the two wines available, and spent a happy hour talking with its sociable manager.
In the evening we again ate very well (prawns, mussels and a shared grilled fish secondo) at La Meridiana where the staff were both efficient and friendly. I was spellbound by its beautiful floor known as Terrazza alla Veneziana; thousands of small stones of various colours mixed in either resin or limestone cement and then ground flat; polished, and finally waxed or varnished.
Friday 11 September
David spent the morning doing battle with the software designed to transpose the recording of his conversations yesterday with Marco. It coped with the English but ignored the Italian. All very trying! More electronic and serpentine confusion below…
La Motta’s Pranzo del Giorno is a bargain for €18 if simple, though the vegetables (french beans) in the insalate Nicoise were a pleasant change. We wandered back to the hotel were I took up a shady position near the tiny pool to write this. David took some exercise in the company of his ear phones and podcasts (the afterchat of an eight goal match between Chelsea and Leeds (5 – 3), the fate of Hants CCC and a very strange England v Pakistan match at Edgbaston).
Francesco Stratta of Dea arrived soon after 16.00 as arranged, to collect us from the hotel and show us around his vineyards close by Vallone’s, if on the other side of a hill. He was keen for us to know about the local sights, including the small private train which entrances in the autumn as the leaves change colour on the mountains through which it passes. We caught a glimpse of said train as it passed their winery (which houses the honey processing- his nephew Manuele is the chief bee keeper) and Francesco is gripped by the history and primitive but efficient technology of honey extraction. Old hives and equipment reside in his yard, including an old brenta (container for picked grapes) which when empty still weighs ten kilos, and copper sulphate pump sprayers.
Emanuele his wife, whom we had met at Taste Piemonte last November, joined us to taste, having prepared some lardo, cheese and of course honey, with some brown bread made from a local hardy grain, adapted for the lower temperatures. Francesco’s family were in the building trade, but sold up most of the business twenty years ago to embark on Dea.
We were back in the hotel by 19.55, in time to change for dinner at Ad Hoc, whose set menu included scallops, exquisite prawn capaccio, and cervo (venison) and unusually, a delightful dessert. All small, delicate dishes prepared and presented with great finesse. The best fine dining we have enjoyed for a quite a while! The chef turned out to be the heavily tattooed youth talking animatedly to a single diner who we learned owned another ristorante. The wafer thin discs of a slightly sweet vegetable turned out to be celeriac ! (Sedano rapa)
Wines by the glass were proffered by a shy and tentative young woman; a more positive vibe came from a very able, lively Argentinian woman whose home community all spoke Italian. Despite having been open for three years, there were only six or eight covers this Friday evening. It deserves to prosper, and may be better patronised – by the Swiss perhaps – in full summer.
We hope so…
Saturday 12 September
We left the hotel at 08.35, walked to the station to catch the 08.55 to Gallarate, arriving at 09.57, and awaited the 10.24 (on the same platform) to Milano Centrale, first stop Malpensa T2. We arrived at 10.32, walked 200m along the new covered way from this brand new station to the Terminal. So far so good.
The long wait ahead of us was not so good. Trains are less frequent, and several replaced by buses as Trenord upgrades the lines to the north, so we had chosen to arrive early. The upgrades may take three years! Our 15.20 flight wasn’t scheduled until 16.06, and even with extra time factored in for slow security, we were waiting for hours.
David collated and recorded his receipts (for tax purposes) while I completed this text. We were airborne by 16.40 EST and arrived at Gatwick by 17.00 BST; caught a quick connection to Clapham and were home well before 20.00. Hurray!
