Lenno

Late morning start today. It was nice to be in a house with a kitchen. I attempted coffee with their coffee maker and failed. Had to dump it all. We had juice, toast with blueberry jam and yogurt. 

Yesterday when we met our friend Mauricio the artist. He suggested that we go to Lenno and the Villa del Balbianello. We really didn't know anything going in, but came out with thinking it was a really nice place to go. Lenno is the fifth ferry stop from Verenna. It took about 60 minutes in all. The walk was about 25 minutes up to the Villa and gardens. It was a pretty walk through the town and the path to the Villa was really well kept. 

These trees are cut to keep their rounded shape.  The tree trimmer climbs up from the bottom and pokes his head out with his trimmer and cuts it like a shrub. It takes 10 days for him to do one tree. 

The land was originally owned by a Cardinal (1796) and he built a chapel on the property. Then an American bought it, (1919) but they never came to stay and the family finally sold it to Guido Monzino (1974).  Well Guido was a weathy grocery chain owner in Milan. He was single and was a mountain climber, climbing many mountains and organizing trips to climb. He remodeled the Villa and chapel. He added many secret passages because he was afraid of being kidnapped in the 70's. 

Guido is buried on the grounds. He left the Villa and gardens to a foundation and requested that it be kept just like it was when he died. Right down to the cigarettes on his desk. He died in 1988 at 60 years old. 

The three pictures above are from a room full of artifacts from his mountain climbing all over the world. 

One of his secret passages. The James Bond movie, Casino Royale and Star Wars episode 2 Attack of the clones had a part filmed there. 

We took the fast hydrofoil back to Verenna. It only took 25 minutes. 

We laughed today at all the people taking pictures of the backs of their significant other looking out at the lake. So...in keeping with the trend.