Sweet Side Trip to Sirmione, Sirmione, Italy

I spent 15 glorious days in Italy last year, and my agenda was full of amazing places to go and things to see. But, in my OCD way of trying to fit in just one more thing, I had my nose glued to a google map, calculating what was halfway between two cities…and how far off the route it was. “So what do you think about taking an 8 km detour at lunchtime? I mean, we’d want to get a bite to eat, anyway, right?” The rest of my family knew that was code for “I found a place to explore - please, please, please say yes!”

It’s so hard for me to drive past interesting ruins and medieval towns without stopping! The best I can do is snap photos from the car as we speed by. We were making our way from Padova on the east coast of Italy, to Milan. We wanted to arrive with time to check into our apartment and see a few things before nightfall, so I knew our sidetrip couldn’t be long. But I couldn’t stand the thought of driving past the largest lake in Italy with a 13th century castle 5 miles away from the A4.

So perhaps everyone was getting hungry. Or maybe the first sunshine we’d seen in three days was making everyone amenable. But in any case, I got the go-ahead! We only had about an hour to explore. ...... (follow the instructions below for accessing the rest of this article).