New Year's Eve in Como, Italy

New Year’s Eve is a special day for us.  While Christmas has to be the favorite as a time spent with family, gifts, and a festive meal that rivals Thanksgiving, New Year’s Eve offers the celebration of a clean slate.  To ring in the new year right and allow the upcoming year to start anew, we like to spend the turning of the calendar in a new city every year.  It’s our way of presenting the upcoming 365 days with fresh surroundings and new adventures starting January 1.

Piacere Como!

Lake Como

For 2024, our journeys took us to Como, Italy to ring in the new year.  Located in the far north of the country on the southern tip of Lake Como, the city sits less than 5 miles from the border of Switzerland.  Even though the lake is only the third largest, it is by far the most popular in all of Italy.  Surrounded by Pre-Alp mountains, the combination of peaks and lake creates a picturesque setting, which is why several “A-Listers”, and popular movies (Star Wars!) set up here.  Because it’s Italy, Como contains its own collection of historic buildings, monuments, and sculptures dating back to the Roman Empire.  Mixed with influences from its long history in the silk industry, Como is a unique city.

New Year’s Eve Day Fun

At Osteria Dal Pain with our local guide

To kick off our New Year’s celebration, we started our afternoon with a food and drink walking tour.  We love taking guided tours with a local.  Getting their perspective and letting them lead you around to some of their favorite spots introduces you to the city and helps with ideas for later in your stay.  Several apps offer great options.  We typically

find what we are looking for on Viator, or in this case, Get Your Guide.  The rainy afternoon was spent roaming the Como streets and hopping in and out of food stops, sampling their specialties.  The first three of our five stops offered a lovely charcuterie board at Vintage Jazz Food and Wine, mixed small-bite appetizers, and a very filling example of local comfort food at Osteria dal Pain. Warm and cozy inside, our Polenta Uncia and Pizzoccheri filled and warmed our bellies too.  Being Italy, the next stop gave us the pick me up of afternoon espresso before topping the tour with Sfogliatelle (cloud pastries) for dessert at Luista.  Light and fluffy so not too filling we opted to order an extra to go, just in case.

Pre Party

It wouldn’t be New Year’s Eve without dinner and cocktails to get the festivities rolling.  After realizing our original dinner plans were 30 minutes from our hotel and not suitable for the evening's plans, we struggled to find a last-minute substitute.  As fate would have it, Piazza Roma Como was along our path earlier on our walking tour so we dolled ourselves up and took a chance.  Bingo!  The owner graciously found us a table open between reservations in his rustic but elegant shop.  From the all-Italian menu we blindly guessed at a couple of dishes and hoped for the best.  My grilled beef filet arrived deliciously.  Aly’s dish came out as quite a surprise.  Her Tagliolino al Missoltino del Lario, which is considered a local delicacy, was a bit unsettling for her taste.  A whole, salt-preserved, dried fish was politely delivered partially covered in pasta with cream sauce leaving the head and tail exposed.  Ever the gentleman, she very much enjoyed the beef filet.  I at least enjoyed the wine and Tiramisu.

Countdown to 2024

Our abbreviated dinner slot left us plenty of time to enjoy a round or two rounds of drinks at Bar Hemingway.  Good libations and a cozy atmosphere gave us a chance to let our food settle and talk about the year it was and was to come.  But the true highlight of the evening is, of course, the countdown to midnight.  With about 10 minutes to spare, we followed the masses to Piazza Cavour on the shore of Lake Como, where the party was underway.  Little did we know that we were about to see a fireworks show we couldn’t have predicted.  It lasted nearly an hour!  Nonstop!  Flying over the lake, the city lit the now clear sky with explosions.  Throughout the mountains, as far as you could see, locals

Lake Como Firework Show

and surrounding small towns fired off even their own.  And in the crowd around us, people dropped firecrackers and small fireworks to celebrate 2024.  There was joy and celebration everywhere you looked, and just when you thought the fireworks were done, another cycle filled the night.  It was quite the spectacle to start the new year.  The fireworks finally came to an end over the lake, and we closed the night back at Bar Hemingway with nightcaps before the short walk back to the Albergo Hotel Terminus.  We can only hope 2025 rings in with as much gusto as 2024!