Instead of Bergamo
Instead of Bergamo: hill towns and mountain towns within 2 hours
Bergamo Alta is a walled upper town reached by funicular, and it now doubles as the day trip for everyone flying into a low-cost airport an hour away.
The valleys behind it, and the hills toward Franciacorta and Iseo, carry the same Lombard stone without the arrival hall attached.
Hill towns and mountain towns in our catalogue within 2 hours of Bergamo by road, ranked by outside recognition. Bergamo itself and the other famous places are left out. 29 towns match; the 12 best-recognised are below.
Instead of Bergamo
Bergamo · 119,534 residents · Lombardia
- GromoBergamo
Mountain town · Borghi più belli d'Italia
- From Bergamo
- 1h 5m by car
- Residents
- 1,141
- When to go
- May–Oct
- Castell'ArquatoPiacenza
Hill town · Borghi più belli d'Italia
- From Bergamo
- 1h 34m by car
- Residents
- 4,617
- When to go
- Apr–Oct
- VernascaPiacenza
Hill town · Borghi più belli d'Italia
- From Bergamo
- 1h 49m by car
- Residents
- 2,004
- When to go
- Apr–Oct
- VogognaVerbano-Cusio-Ossola
Hill town · Borghi più belli d'Italia
- From Bergamo
- 1h 51m by car
- By train
- Reachable
- Residents
- 1,680
- When to go
- Apr–Oct
- BiennoBrescia
Hill town · Borghi più belli d'Italia
- From Bergamo
- 1h 43m by car
- Residents
- 3,767
- When to go
- Apr–Oct
The 5 best-recognised of the 29 towns that match. Drive times measured by road from Bergamo. More of them follow below.
Gromo
Province: Bergamo · 676 m
A medieval iron-forging town at 676 meters on a rock spur above the Serio, once called the little Toledo for its sword smiths.
Castell'Arquato
Province: Piacenza · 224 m
A 224-meter hilltop borgo in the Val d'Arda, kept intact since the tenth century and crowned by Luchino Visconti's 1342 fortress.
Vernasca
Province: Piacenza · 457 m
A Val d'Arda commune in the Piacenza Apennines, holding the walled village of Vigoleno and one of the most compact castled borghi in Emilia.
Vogogna
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 226 m
An Ossola medieval capital at 226 meters on the Toce, with a castle of 1348 and five centuries as seat of the lower valley's jurisdiction.
Bienno
Province: Brescia · 445 m
A medieval ironworking village where water hammers driven by the Grigna stream have shaped wrought iron since the 1200s.
Clusone
Province: Bergamo · 648 m
At 648 meters, capital of the macabre fresco and the 1583 planetary clock above its civic tower.
Candelo
Province: Biella · 350 m
A Biellese commune at 350 meters whose Ricetto, a 13th-century fortified shelter of two hundred stone cellule, is the best-preserved in Piedmont.
Biella
Province: Biella · 417 m
A wool city at 417 meters in the Alpine foothills, where the medieval Piazzo sits above the modern Piano, connected by a funicular since 1885.
Varallo
Province: Vercelli · 450 m
The capital of Valsesia at 450 meters, crowned by a forty-five-chapel devotional complex on the rock above town.
Cimbergo
Province: Brescia · 851 m
A village of 533 at 851 meters above the Oglio, with castle ruins on a spur and UNESCO petroglyphs on the slopes below.
Serralunga di Crea
Province: Alessandria · 302 m
A commune of 503 holding the Sacro Monte di Crea, a UNESCO Sacri Monti site of 23 chapels around a Marian sanctuary.
Tignale
Province: Brescia · 560 m
A six-hamlet commune on a high terrace above Lake Garda's western shore, anchored by a clifftop sanctuary and the last working limonaie north of Salò.
Drive times measured by road from Bergamo. A town with no time shown is one the router could not reach, usually because it is served by ferry. How this data is built.