Italy Day 4: Arona

Time to travel a little further afield – down the lake to Arona! My FB sources claimed it was a cute town so at 9am I hopped on the ferry to see it for myself.

*One of the ferry stops was the 12thC hermitage of Sta Caterina perched above the lake*

It was a 1h15m ride on the ferry leaving me about 2.5 hours to explore Arona (the only return ferry was at 1pm).

I started with a 30 minute walk to the Colossus of San Carlo. Other than seeing it on Google Maps and again from the water on the ferry I knew nothing about it. And still don’t really other than it was built in 1698(!) to celebrate Charles Borromeo, a former archbishop of Milan who died in 1584. As soon as he died his family pushed to get him sainted (those ambitious Borromeos!) and in 1614 they started building this great edifice in his honor.

Astonishingly it remained the largest bronze statue until Lady Liberty came along. And, if you’re crazy enough or didn’t know better like me, you can pay an extra 3 euros to climb up inside!

*He’s really big. See that tiny human in the foreground?*

First there’s narrow circular stairs around the back that you climb up to the viewing platform. Then there’s an insane climb inside the statue itself up a metal ladder not just vertical but with rungs slanted down so you’re going up leaning backwards in a tiny vertical shaft. It’s boiling hot so even your sandaled feet and hands are sweating & slippery and you have to keep a death grip on the struts holding the ladder to the stonework because holding the ladder would mean them just sliding down on the slick polished metal. Am I selling it well?

*Looking up. I bet the guy watching the camera gets a laugh at everyone’s look of fear. Only 2 are allowed up at a time as it’s so small at the top.*

*Weird reverse image of his face, is this the real Chuck? Benevolent on the outside* *and evil on the inside??*

So, after the Tower of Terror I trekked back down to Arona and had a quick window shop thru the old town. So many lovely stores but only had time to swivel my head back and forth as I had a ferry to catch. Italians sure have perfected the art of window dressing.