Italian Lakes September
 

Planning 10 day trip to Lake District in mid September with a side trip to the Dolomite region. Looking for input on Itinerary.
1. Fly to Milan from US. Rent car at airport (Autoeurope best choice for car rental?) and drive to Bellagio for a 3 night stay at Hotel Belvedere. The options are to use very expensive transport service to take us to Bellagio, try to navigate public transportation after flying overnight, or driving. We will not need a car in Bellagio but the three day cost would be about the same as private transport. Leaving lake Como on Sunday and rental car agencies are not open, could pick up in Como on Sat. however limited hours and if something did not work we would be stuck without car to take to next destination. Day trips to Tremezzo, Menaggio and Varenna.
2. Drive to Dolomite region...looks to be 4 hour drive. Stay at Alder Spa in Ortisei, Val Gardena for 3 nights. Hiking, biking, driving the Great Dolomite road. What are the best of the Dolomites???
3. Drive to Stresa, Lake Maggiore stay at Hotel La Palma for last 3 nights. Day trips? Isola Bella, take train to Domodossola, then Locarno, ferry back to Stresa, can we do in one day? Should we day trip to Lugano from Bellagio or Stresa?
4. Departure day - 9:35 am flight out of MXP leave hotel at 5:30 to drive to airport and return rental car arriving at airport 3 hours before flight 6:30...enough time, is this realistic??
Any input on itinerary, transportation, day trips etc would be much appreciated. Thank you so much in advance!!

Since ypu'll stay at Belvedere in Bellagio which has parking ,pick up your car at MXP. To pick up a car after Bellagio entails a ferry down to the city of Como, a walk to car rental agencies. We have done that several times when we've spent an extended stay in Bellagio. For three days with parking, it will be easier to get it at the airport. We always use AutoEurope, a US based broker.

You have a ton of questions here---see if this TR may help you:

http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...-gold-trip.cfm

If you do drive to Bellagio consider taking the road on the west shore and ferry cross from Cadenabbia. The drive up the middle can be a challenge. I would hire the driver after a long flight.

Or, check out this shuttle service:

www.flytolake.com

I was just at maggiore for 5 nights... a rental car is necessary I feel in the whole region, although the boats are fine too... we stayed in baveno next to stressa. it took us 5 hours to drive around the lake with a 1/2 hour picnic... quite honestly we thought baveno and stress and the surrounding towns were by far the best... my wife went out to the island gardens one morning and liked it quite well... 13E admission and 7.8E boat ride...

go up in the hills behind baveno and stressa, it's quite lovely...

I would be more comfortable with staying near malpenssa on my last night...