Hello,
My husband and I are planning to spend the last two days of our trip to Italy at Lake Como (either in Varenna or Bellagio). We are flying out of Malpensa Airport at 9:45 am on Saturday...we were hoping to either drive or take public transportation to and from the lake - but I am concerned about travel time.

Everything you read says this is a quick trip but I am finding it hard to figure out whether this is doable with such an early flight. Should we drive (we will have a rental car for the rest of our trip) or take the public transportation? or is there a better option near the airport for the last 2 days? We will be travelling up from tuscany the previous day.

Any help is greatly appreciated!!

ouch! the Trenitalia site says that the earliest train out from Varenna is 6:17 a.m. btw, you still need almost an hour to take the shuttle to Malpensa. If you're starting from Bellagio, you need to get to Como to take either the ferrovienord train (transferring at Saronno?) to Malpensa (http://www.ferrovienord.it/webmxp/in...e-dove-ing.htm) or the airport bus (http://www.sptcomo.it/malpensa.php). We looked at this issue with an afternoon flight and opted to stay in Milan proper.

http://www.trenitalia.com/en/index.html

You're right to be concerned.

It is NOT "a quick trip"!

Hi teakdog!

We just did this same trip last week. We hired a driver both ways to and from Malpensa, because the road is extremely narrow for about an hour going into Bellagio,( few and sometimes no guardrails on the lake side of the road and lots of hairpin and/or blind turns!) and we didn't feel comfortable driving it ourselves.

Going to Bellagio from Malpensa along what the driver called "The French coast", the trip took just under two hours. We sat in traffic for part of the time in the early afternoon.

Coming back from Bellagio to Malpensa for a 10AM Alitalia flight, we decided to leave at 6 AM, and were at Malpensa by 7:30.

If I were to do it again, I'd opt to stay either in Milan ( about 50 minutes from Malpensa) or Stresa ( about 40 minutes from Malpensa. It would probably be much less stressful!

there are frequent airport buses to Malpensa from Como and i believe these buses also serve Bellagio - much quicker than the train. Can always boat to Como if the bus doesn't serve Bellagio.

Look at a map and do not stay in Bellagio nor in Varenna. With a car, and leaving at 0530, you could make it from Menaggio with time to drop the car. You can also hire a driver for about 150E.

Thank you all for your helpful thoughts. I am thinking it may be too stressful to try and make the early morning trip (Weadles - thanks for the tip on hiring a driver!)

Does anyone know if Stresa is worth seeing? I'm really not interested in seeing Milan but see no other towns of interest near enough the airport....any thoughts?

Stresa is very nice lakeside resort and just off the coast are the famous three Borromean Islands, each with something wondrous on them - boats all the time from Stresa - you won't be bored and direct buses probably to Malpensa - perhaps closer to airport than Milano.

Orta San Giulio on Lake Orta!

Beautiful and less than an hour from Malpensa.