How to get to Lake Como from Malpensa, Linate or Bergamo

"Lake Como" is an incomplete answer. The lake is shaped like an upside-down Y, and Como, Cernobbio, Tremezzo, Bellagio and Varenna sit on different shores, served by different roads. Before choosing how to get there, it pays to know where you are sleeping.

The lake in thirty seconds

• Como and Cernobbio: the south-western tip, reached by motorway. The closest part to Milan and its airports.
• The western shore (Moltrasio, Tremezzo, Menaggio): a single lakeside road, the Statale Regina, narrow in many places.
• Bellagio: on the point where the lake divides. By car you reach it from Como along the eastern shore, or from the Lecco side.
• Varenna: on the Lecco arm, eastern shore, with a railway station on the line to Tirano.

From Malpensa

The nearest airport to Como and the western shore: 51 km and about 50 minutes to Como, a little more to Cernobbio. For Tremezzo and Bellagio it rises towards an hour and a half, because the last 30 km are driven on the lake road.

There is no direct train: you take the Malpensa Express to Saronno and change there for Como Nord Lago, about an hour and twenty minutes in all. That works for Como itself; for the other villages you add a boat or a bus.

From Linate

Linate is Milan's city airport, east of the centre, and suits travellers on domestic and European flights. Como is 54 km and nearly an hour away, because the route crosses the Milan ring road; Bellagio is about an hour and a quarter. By public transport you have to go through central Milan and catch a train to Como: two changes, with luggage.

From Bergamo Orio al Serio

The low-cost airport, and often the most convenient for the Lecco arm: Varenna and Bellagio are 63 km away, under an hour and a half by road. For Como itself, though, Bergamo is the furthest choice: 82 km.

The final stretch: the part nobody explains

The motorway miles go quickly; what stretches the journey is the lake roads. The Statale Regina and the Lariana road are narrow, with squeezes between houses where two cars can barely pass, and in summer they are busy. They are not roads to tackle after an overnight flight in an unfamiliar hire car. Many lakeside hotels also have limited parking or sit inside restricted traffic zones.

By train to Varenna

From Milano Centrale the line to Tirano calls at Varenna-Esino in just over an hour. From Varenna the ferry crosses to Bellagio and Menaggio. A lovely, slow option for those travelling light with time to spare.

When a private transfer makes sense

When there are more than two of you, with proper luggage, and when your destination is beyond the two or three places the train serves. The price is fixed and per vehicle, luggage and tolls included; the driver waits in arrivals with a name board, up to 60 minutes after landing. And knows where the car stops outside your hotel — which, on the lake, is no small detail.