Lake towns
Lake towns in Piedmont
11 towns
Towns on the northern lakes and the quieter volcanic ones further south. Water without the coast road.
Gozzano
Province: Novara · 367 m
The town at the southern tip of Lake Orta, marked by a basilica and a twelfth-century signaling tower above the water.
Omegna
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 295 m
The Lake Orta town at 295 meters where Bialetti, Lagostina and Alessi turned a steel valley into Italy's household-goods capital.
Orta San Giulio
Province: Novara · 294 m
A promontory facing an islet basilica, with a UNESCO complex of Francis-of-Assisi chapels on the hill above.
Cannero Riviera
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 225 m
A commune of 900 on the western shore, fronted by three rocky islets whose Borromeo ruins are the town's signature view.
Cannobio
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 214 m
A medieval lake town at 214 meters on Maggiore's western shore, host to one of the largest Sunday markets on the lake.
Arona
Province: Novara · 212 m
A town at the southern tip of a lake, watched over by a colossus finished in 1698.
Baveno
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 205 m
A lake town at 205 meters whose quarries supplied columns for Milan's cathedral and a major basilica in Rome.
Mergozzo
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 204 m
A village on the western shore of a small lake cut off from its larger neighbor by river sediment, with a centuries-old elm on its lakefront piazza.
Ghiffa
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 201 m
A Lake Maggiore lakeside village facing the Lombard shore, with a UNESCO sanctuary on the slope above it and a century of hat-making behind it.
Stresa
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 200 m
A Lake Maggiore resort town at 200 meters, facing the Borromean Islands and running the Settimane Musicali since 1962.
Belgirate
Province: Verbano-Cusio-Ossola · 199 m
A small Lake Maggiore village at 199 meters whose Chiesa Vecchia di Santa Maria has held its 11th-century Romanesque bell tower for nine hundred years.
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From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Taurasi
Province: Avellino
An Irpinia wine village at 400 meters above the Calore valley, the southern home of Aglianico called Barolo of the South.
Ulassai
Province: Nuoro
The highest village in Ogliastra, at 775 meters on a ledge beneath the Tacchi.
Udine
Province: Udine
The historic capital of Friuli, built around a man-made castle hill.
Framura
Province: La Spezia
Five hamlets between sea level and 300 meters on the Riviera di Levante, with Byzantine watchtowers built against Saracen incursions.
Corvara in Badia
Province: Bolzano
The Ladin centre of Alta Badia at 1,568 metres, at the foot of the Sassongher, on the four-pass Sellaronda ski circuit.