Today’s journey was predominantly Motorway again, no beautiful mountain passes today. Having said that, from the pictures we have seen, Lake Garda is pretty special so worth the long motorway drive.
Up bright and early again this morning, this is definitely not a long lie type of holiday! We decided to try the site restaurant for breakfast this morning and not bad at all actually but I nearly collapsed at the price!! 💶💶💶💶
Before we set off though, learning from my mistake of the previous leg, I decided to check to see if there were any crazy things needed to drive in Italy 🇮🇹. Just as well I did! It turns out you need a driving permit to go along with your UK license. I was able to do this online and pay for the express service which guaranteed the permit within 15 minutes.
So, fed, watered and legal today, off we set. The route took us towards Lugano, Locarno, Como, outskirts of Milan, Torino, into San Felicedel Benaco and the campsite Europa Silvella. Eddy seems to have been running on fresh air over the last couple of days. His tank was still more or less full from the previous leg in the Alps 🏔🤷🏼♂️. So we were able to crack on. As we approached Lugano, the traffic was heavy (nose to tail for a few miles). It was the same into Locarno and through the town. As we climbed out the town to wards yet another tunnel through the mountains (longest one we’ve driven through so far at 5.6km) the rain started, light at first but ended up torrential for about 15 minutes. We crossed the border into Italy 🇮🇹 And after about 50 minutes of driving, we stopped for lunch an fuel around 12:30, just a motorway service station though. To our surprise though, the food selection was huge and looked very nice. This was a full menu, not just sandwiches and the usual sort of stuff you get at home. Lunch consisted of a lovely fresh slice of Pizza 🍕 for both of us with a soft drink. We even found cool Coke flasks which actually fit in normal cup holders. The only bummer with lunch is, its cost me a trip to the dentist when we get home, one of my molers broke in half when I bit into the Pizza 🍕 crust! 🙈 🙈
After we scanned the Pizza 🍕, we went to fuel Eddy. Now this is what I meant by running on fresh air, Eddy had not even consumed half a tank yet so topping up only consisted of a mere 20ltrs! 🤷🏼♂️. All good I suppose, I recon Eddy is just in his element. 😂😉🤷🏼♂️. So we set off for the last 90 miles or so to Lake Garda. Again apart from the last 19 miles, this was again motorway so seemed to fly by. Most of the journeys so far have flown in really. Must be the combination of being in Eddy and listening to #VirginRadio basting away through DAB and the Bluetooth speaker (it works better than the built in Pioneer unit in terms of sound quality). 😂
I didn’t look at the time of the last leg of today’s route but it didn’t seem long until we left the motorway and only had 19 miles to go. We were getting closer to the mountains again so the scenery was up a notch, very pleasant. So we rolled into the Europa Silvella Campsite and were already impressed with the drive way never mind the site itself. Lovely. Check in was simple and the staff were very friendly. We made our way to the pitch and decided to get a shift on and get camp set up sharpish so we could go explore the shores of Lake Garda and the rest of the site. It was by far the biggest site we have visited so far.
Camp set up and ready to rock. Lol just thought of this and couldn’t resist putting it in the blog, “Rock steady Eddy”. 😂😂. I know I shouldn’t laugh at my own jokes but nobody else does. 😂😂😂🤷🏼♂️
So we decided to go for a dander around this huge and beautiful Campsite. We wandered down to the beach and come across one of Mrs’s biggest fears (she has many btw 😂), a lizard.🦎. So that put paid to the beach time. 🏝😂🤷🏼♂️ We then found the mini market which wasn’t actually that mini. We went in to grab some breakfast supplies only to be greeted by a lovely Italian woman who noticed my Samcro T-shirt (hopefully everyone reading this knows what Samcro is, if not Google it). Without as much as a Bonjurno (good afternoon in Italian), we were greeted by a long stretched out “Saaaaaamcroow”!!😂. After which ensued a long broken English/Italian conversation about the series Sons of Anarchy. We ended up discussing our mutual liking for box sets and leaving her with recommendations of the likes of Suits, Designated Survivor and Night Agent. 🤷🏼♂️😂 There was one last twist to the mini market visit though, I was asked to help her write a sign in English for her counter requesting punters not to but the shopping baskets on the counter, only goods to be scanned should be on the counter. She already had about every other language bar English (obviously not many predominantly English visitors yet this season). We duly obliged and she was well happy. Seriously now for a moment. Isn’t it great when you see someone genuinely delighted with your help? Priceless really! 😊
After visiting the shop, we decided for easiness to just try the Campsite restaurant tonight so went to make a reservation just in case it got busy. 7pm was our chosen time. We then headed back to Eddy for some chill time (in my case putting the bones of today’s blog together and in Mrs’s case, painting her toe nails! 🤢😂🤷🏼♂️ To be honest, the chill time disappeared fast and before we knew it, it was 6:50. So we headed backdown to the restaurant. You might be thinking why I am using the term “down to the restaurant”, well one thing I haven’t mentioned yet is the Campsite is on a hill (when I say hill, I mean a hill) with the beach at the bottom of the hill, mini market and restaurant all just up from the beach and the pitches etc higher up.
We arrived at the restaurant not really knowing what to expect. Mrs had done her usual research (about three hours worth 😂) and told me all about how good it looked. Guess what though, I wasn’t listening. 😂 Inside the restaurant was lovely and spacious. We were seated and given a menu (this was more like a paperback book 😂). Loads of delicious looking pictures of various different dishes, plenty to choose from, I am not joking now, they even had a menus for dogs 🐕!!!! Best bit was, none of the dishes seemed even remotely expensive. 💶
We made our choices and waited with bated breath. It did not take log at all for the starters to arrive, Parma Ham and Melon for me and Bruschetta for Mrs. Wow already! We finished up the starters and then the mains arrive in perfect time, Ribs for me and Fillet of Beef for Mrs, wow again!! Well it would have rude not to finish with a sweet, so I opted for a Affogato Chocolini (Ice cream and hot chocolate) and Mrs couldn’t resist her favourite Crème Brûlée. I have to say honestly this meal was excellent and could have been in any of the top restaurants never mind a Campsite. 😊👏. Then there was the value for money, just brilliant at €72. 👌🏻
Tomorrow’s route takes us back up and into the Alps 🏔 and into yet another country, Austria 🇦🇹. Driving the length of Lake Garda past Trento, Bolzano and right into Alpine Country again. Really looking forward to this leg. Tra for now. 🇮🇹 👋👋👋👋
TBC, 👋