Lake Garda for Andrea's Birthday

Friday May 23rd was Andrea's 25th birthday and I semi-surprised him with a weekend in Lake Garda (with me, of course) for his present. We left early Friday morning and stayed until Sunday night. It was a perfect weekend, and thing to do right before I leave.

Hotel La Rondine

We got to the hotel in Sirmione around 11 and checked in. The hotel was gorgeous! We had a room with a balcony and a lake view. There was a pool and a restaurant with outside seating overlooking the pool and the lake.

our balcony

Then we headed into town to have lunch and explore. We ate at a little pizzeria, just as it started to rain. So after lunch we ran across the street to an enoteca (wine shop), had some wine and waited for the rain to stop. The rain let up pretty quickly and the sun came back so we walked around the town. There was a public beach with a dock, and then we headed up to the Grotto (ancient Roman ruins on the tip of the peninsula with panoramic views). We saw some beautiful water and tried to go down to see if we could swim, but it was blocked off. So we decided to go back to the hotel and go for a swim in the pool. We had dinner at the hotel and went to bed early.

me at the gardens of the Thermal Spa

great view through the Roman ruins

us in front of where we wanted to go swimming

We decided to spend Saturday sitting out in the sun because it was the day that looked "the best" on the weather forecast. None of the days looked great but Saturday had the least chance of rain. So we spent the morning in the sun by the pool and then had lunch outside at the hotel restaurant, as it was getting a little cloudy.

outside seating at our hotel restaurant

Unfortunately the afternoon and evening were spent in the hotel room because neither one of us was feeling very well, but at least we got our money's worth out of the hotel room! We had dinner again at the hotel restaurant (it was really good!) and got some rest in hopes to recover for Sunday.

view of the sunset from our room

Sunday we both felt fine, so we checked out of the hotel and went back to town to see what kind of excursions we could take. We ended up taking a little boat around the Sirmione Peninsula, which was nice. Then it started to rain a little so we decided to take a driving tour around the entire lake.

castle in Sirmione

peninsula of Sirmione

Our first destination was Gardone, where Gabrielle D'annunzio, one of Andrea's favorite poets, lived. We got to tour the house and the gardens and it was actually really interesting. They even had an english translation! I am glad we got to see it because that was part of the idea of my gift to him.

great views from Vittoriale (D'annunzio's house)

Then we drove up to Riva, which we thought would be cool but it was actually a pretty quiet town, cute of course, but quiet. We took a little kiddy train around the town and then visited a reptile museum, where we saw all these giant snakes.

Andrea on the kiddy train in Riva

Then we drove home, stopping at another small lake along the way. We had a really great weekend together!!