Lake Garda

In a bit of a break from our usual, we stayed in a resort, rather than a house or flat. The resort was right on the banks of the southern end of the lake, putting us in a prime spot for good views and interesting towns to explore, but still full of bars, swimming pools and shops to try to persuade us otherwise. After an early start and a long journey (with a five-year-old who was not a big fan of going through security on the way out, but completely non-plussed by the two-hour plane journey, and then border control and hire car pickup at Verona airport staffed by people who were not to be rushed), we did little more than move in, stock up and relax on the Saturday we arrived. On the Sunday we went for an explore, but very quickly got distracted by one of the pools and spent most of the day there.

On the Monday, we planned to go a little further afield. The park had a road train that took you to the nearest town, and that was our idea for the day. Unfortunately we learned that morning that, thanks to a market taking place in the town, the train wasn’t running – but that it wasn’t really much of a walk. So, we decided to walk along the lakeside into the town to see what the market was like.

Considering it was quite hot and sunny, we welcomed the line of trees along the route.

The only downside to where we were staying is that the picturesque mountains were across the water – it made for a great backdrop, but it would have been nice to be amongst them.

I loved the way the coast snaked round towards the town, and given the harsh light I decided to shoot a HDR just to give me the most freedom in the edit.

As we walked along, by a small marina I spotted a motorcycle, and I was captivated by its chrome.

Near here there were some steps into the water. Wife and child sat here, fascinated by some of the wildlife – especially the little fish who had a large lump of bread to feast on. Before we left, I whipped out my phone for a quick long exposure.

We soon arrived at the town, ‎⁨Peschiera del Garda⁩, ⁨and wandered around the market for a little while. After seeing most of the stalls, we found a cool bridge over into a walled part of the town. From there, there were some good views of the moat we were crossing.

For the shot above I experimented with using the flowers as a foreground element. I’m not entirely convinced by it, although I like the contrasting splash of colour. There is a slightly differently-framed version without the flowers in the gallery below.

We had some lunch (our kid ate pizza, basically the only thing he ate when we ate out, other than ice cream or breadsticks – but he did have a cheese and tomato pizza sprinkled with parmesan at every opportunity), then we went for a wander. I was able to get some decent town shots, accidentally all with a theme of ‘yellow’, something I tried to emphasise when editing.

We walked back over a different bridge, giving us a great view of the moored boats.

We walked along the bank on the left of the shot above. From there, there were some more yellow buildings to see.

Helpfully, a swan came by, to contrast with the blue water.

It was hard not to photograph this spot. Some town planner somewhere apparently had the wherewithal to have the buildings in contrasting colours to the blue of the water.

We got to the end of this little section, where there was what looked to be some sort of fortification. It gave me the opportunity for a classic flag shot.

Even here I managed to spot a train. Nothing steam-powered, unfortunately, and I had the wrong lens for it, but still – it scratched an itch.

We could also look back to the water along which we had just walked.

We wandered back into the fortified part of the town, where I got another back alley shot.

We came to a piazza, where our kid could play in some fountains for a while. I squeezed off a quick shot of one of the buildings nearby.

It was around this point that our child needed the toilet. Whilst mother and child were preoccupied, I photographed the nearby city hall.

When they came back, we went and bought some hats from the kind shopkeeper who gave us 50¢ to use the public toilet, when made our walk back home. Which meant, for the most part, more interesting shots of the shoreline, but this time with the water on the right.

We paused on the way back, near where the motorcycle had been earlier, to have another look at the fish in the water. From this low angle I could get another shot from a low angle looking back the way we’d just come.

The next day, we agreed that I could go out on my own for a day of exploring and photography. I put together a plan (admittedly with the help of the AI Claude) that would see me visit a few places along the southern end of the lake, and hopefully get some interesting driving in along the way too.

The starting point for the day was the commune of Sirmione. I was drawn by the fact it’s on a narrow peninsula jutting out into the lake, the old town was one of many small old Italian towns small enough that cars are banned, and there was a castle to see too. Water, architecture, and exploring towns – it ticked most of the boxes.

The castle, Scaligero Castle, greeted me, standing guard over the drawbridge connecting the old town to the mainland. Ever stubborn, I started shooting almost straight into the morning light.

When I shot the wider castle from this spot, I shot a bracketed exposure to make sure no detail was lost.

I walked up along the path you can see on the left of the shot above, so I could turn back and shoot the side of the castle that was in the sun.

From here, I wandered off along the eastern coastline. I briefly wandered into the town, where the first interesting thing that caught my eye was all the stickers on this lamppost.

Just up from here – by which I mean, just turning your head to the left – there was this nice old street.

At the end of this little street, if you turned left again, you got this view, with the castle in the background.

My wander continued, and I found another little street, with a motorbike for texture.

I soon came across another church, or at least a church-like building.

I continued walking. Nearby was a brightly coloured building, with some nicely coloured windows in it. I tried for a more abstract shot of them, but things were a bit snug get it framed quite how I wanted.

Just up from here was a small beach, the most prominent part of which was this elephant sculpture. I shot it from the shadowy side, emphasising the silhouette of the elephant, further emphasised in editing with some monochrome (the elephant, by the way, was red).

From here you could see the buildings on the shore that had led me through the town in the first place, and behind it the tower of the castle was visible.

After a little while I got a little concerned that I was threatening to walk too far in the heat, and wasn’t sure I wanted to wander all the way to the northern tip of the peninsula (especially as I couldn’t see an immediately obvious path). Instead I looped back, and climbed up a hill. There, I found a church. I didn’t photograph the church much, admittedly, but what caught my eye was the large bell outside. Subsequent research since I returned home has suggested that this is a memorial to fallen Italian soldiers from the Second World War. We actually saw quite a few war memorials across the various places we visited, often in the form of artillery. Clearly the war had a big impact on this part of Italy.

The other thing that caught my eye in the grounds of the church that wasn’t the church was this cat, because cat.

On my walk back towards the old town I walked past this big house which caught my eye.

Back in the old town, I wandered the streets a bit, although things were starting to get a little busy. Soon I wandered by some buildings covered in blossom, which had even caught the attention of the non-photographer people.

The building next to this was even more covered.

More wanderings. Somewhere near the ferry wharf was a restaurant which had a certain something that I found appealing. I took a few shots, and when editing them couldn’t decide if I preferred a monochrome treatment or a more washed out orange treatment, to emphasise the 1970s feel of the scene. Not being able to decide, I offer both.

My timing was just right to see a ferry arrive.

Soon I was back at the drawbridge to leave the old town, which made it an opportune time to leave and head on to the second stop of my plan. I snapped a few quick shots of the castle before I left though.

I left Sirmione. My plan was to head further west to the town of ‎⁨Desenzano del Garda⁩. However, traffic was bad; it took a little while to leave Sirmione (although the traffic trying to enter was far, far worse). And then I got caught in a a queue getting near the town. At some point along the way I got mildly rear ended by an old Italian woman, but since there wasn’t a scratch left on the hire car we made nothing of it. I made it as far as Desenzano, but the car parks I was trying were all full. Eventually I realised that a lot of traffic would be in my future. My plan for after Desenzano was to carry on towards the mountains to see how far I got, but it was becoming likely that it would take a long time. So I turned around and headed back to camp to call it a day.

The next day, Wednesday, we decided to return to our original plan for the previous Monday, and catch the road train into ‎⁨Peschiera del Garda⁩. With no market this time, we were able to explore the town in a more normal setting. There was less people too, making the photographs a bit easier. The archway that covers the entrance to the old fortified town was quite busy a couple of days earlier; today it was all but empty.

Under this archway there was also some ‘tourist go home’ graffiti. Clearly the simmering anti-tourist movement has crept here too – although perhaps if the person who daubed it felt more strongly, they would have used a more contrasting colour. I tried making some tweaks whilst keeping the colour, but struggled to make it pop.

Realising that wasn’t very effective, I selected the text using a very narrow colour selection mask (lest it just pick up most of the wall anyway), then desaturated everything else to make it legible. Even then, it needs you to squint a bit.

After some time visiting the town, on our way back to get the train I was also able to have another go at shooting the scenes from the bridge with slightly different framing.

I was blessed by a boat too, to mix things up a bit.

Then we caught the road train back to the resort.

After I showed my kid some of the photos I took at Scaligero Castle, he decided he wanted to visit it too. So, the next day he and I left his mum at home and went to visit the castle, and actually go inside.

We parked in the same out-of-town car park as last time. This time the light was quite good for the mountains to look interestingly layered.

We soon made it to the castle. Despite us both being afraid of heights, we decided we wanted to climb up the stairs to the upper level. For me I wanted to see the views. For the kid it was about facing his fears. The views were certainly worth it.

From here we could get a far better view of the castle walls out in the water than we possibly could have from the ground.

Not content with walking around on the upper balcony, we decided to go for gold and climb to the very top of the main turret. From here, the views were even more spectacular.

The view of the enclosed water area was also a lot better.

We could also get a really clear view south, where you could see just how narrow the Sirmio Peninsula is.

I soon realised this was good excuse to break out a wider angle lens to capture more of the scenery. This next shot, looking towards the drawbridge into the old town, might give a sense of scale. You can see the lower balcony of the castle, as well as an assortment of people even further below.

By this point child was getting bored so we decided to head back down. The stairs going from the very top of the turret were quite steep though, so we did struggle a bit. Even so, we made it to the ground safely, and I could not be more proud of him for deciding to face a fear, and doing so well at it. We explored the old town a little before heading back to the resort for some victory ice cream, and then spent the afternoon cooling off in the pool.

The next day was our last. We decided to go for another explore, and visit the town I’d failed to get to a few days earlier, ‎⁨Desenzano del Garda. This time, things were a lot quieter, and we had no problem whatsoever finding somewhere to park. We took a stroll along the waterfront from where we parked towards the town proper.

On the way we saw a sculpture. The idea was that is you stood in the right spot, the two halves would line up and shot the outline of Lake Garda.

Definitely doesn’t look like anything else. No sir.

We got into the town, and stopped for a quick drink at a piazza-side cafe, then went for another wander. This gave me a chance to get a few more town shots, like this hotel.

The limit of our wander was this corner, where I got this shot of the street.

On our way back we passed over a bridge, from where we would see this little marina-like place, surrounded with cafes.

Considering what originally tempted me to this town when I planned my visit a few days earlier was an old lighthouse by the harbour, I wanted to make sure I actually went and took a look. Considering the heat, my wife and child sat in a shady spot and waited for me whilst I walked out to get a closer look.

The lighthouse may be old, but it still serves a purpose, so it had a lot of modern technology attached to it.

I walked to up to the end of the breakwater to take a look. There I found a man looking at an old lamppost. I thought the scene had a bit of a look to it.

I reunited with my family to head back towards the car, but very quickly stopped them again to photograph these padlocks attached to a fence.

And with that, we made it back to the car, headed back to the resort, and spent another afternoon cooling off in the pool. The heat was increasingly intense on this holiday; by the back half of the week, the temperature was in the upper-mid twenties (celsius, obviously) first thing in the morning, and would rise steadily to the mid-thirties, and would stay there all evening. It would still often be 35°C at 10pm. And we realised a bit late in the holiday – as one often does – that the best way to deal with this was to get out somewhere in the morning while it was still (relatively) cool, then get back to the resort and go to the pool in the afternoon to cool off.

With it being our last day, I also wanted to make sure I got to do one thing I’d not done all week: pop down to the lakeside at sunset. Luckily we were gifted a half-decent sunset.

The sun soon started to disappear behind either some low cloud on the horizon, or some mountains. Or both. Still worth shooting. In these shots I upped the contrast on the people in the water, hoping to make them a more solid colour.

When the sun dropped below the visible horizon – although I think it was still technically before sunset – the sky added some beautiful blues to its golden shades, as well as some dramatic clouds.

I found some beach to use as a foreground, and broke out the trusty wide angle again.

All in all, this a great first international family holiday. Our child was largely nonplussed by the travel, had a great time in the pool and playing in the towns, as well as the amenities offered by the resort, such as some inflatables and a park with some good swings. I loved Italy too, this being our first substantial time spent there (our only previous visit was for a day during our big European road trip over a decade ago). So we’ll almost certainly be back, although we are considering going earlier in the year when the temperatures aren’t quite so oppressive.

And as always, there are a few extra shots in the gallery below.