Anywhere Italy

Quieter bases

10 alternatives to staying in Verona

Comuni within an hour of Verona with at least one recognition. 10 towns shown, nearest first.

Verona in opera season quotes prices that assume you have no alternative. You have several: recognized comuni within an hour, on the lake shore, the Mincio, the wine hills.

Nearest first. The arena is still forty minutes away; your evening piazza just stopped charging admission.

  1. 1.Valeggio sul Mincio26 minVerona · VenetoA moraine-hills town at 88 meters between Garda and Mantua, with a 1393 Visconti bridge-dam over the Mincio and a tortellino called the love knot.
  2. 2.Peschiera del Garda33 minVerona · VenetoThe Venetian fortress town on a Mincio island at the southern outlet of Lake Garda, UNESCO-listed in 2017 for its Sanmicheli bastions.
  3. 3.Castellaro Lagusello37 minMantova · LombardyA walled medieval borgo south of Lake Garda, ringed by 13th-century stone walls and overlooking a small heart-shaped natural lake that gives the village its second name and most-photographed silhouette.
  4. 4.Monzambano37 minMantova · LombardyA Mincio commune at 88 meters in the moraine hills west of Mantova, whose frazione Castellaro Lagusello sits on a heart-shaped lake inside fortified walls.
  5. 5.Sirmione39 minBrescia · LombardyA 4-kilometer peninsula reaching into the southern Garda, with the Scaliger fortified port and the Roman villa called the Grotte di Catullo at its tip.

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  1. 6.Lazise40 minVerona · VenetoThe walled port on the southeastern shore of Lake Garda granted the right to fortify in 983, considered the first comune in Italy.
  2. 7.Lonato del Garda42 minBrescia · LombardyA hilltop commune on the southwestern Garda morainic ridge, with a Visconti Rocca and the 52,000-volume Casa del Podestà library.
  3. 8.Volta Mantovana42 minMantova · LombardyA morainic hill town between Mantua and Lake Garda where Ludovico Gonzaga built a country palace inside the old medieval castle.
  4. 9.Sant'Ambrogio di Valpolicella42 minVerona · VenetoThe Valpolicella DOC gateway northwest of Verona, where the Gargagnago frazione anchors Amarone production and the San Giorgio frazione holds a Lombard-era pieve.
  5. 10.Bardolino44 minVerona · VenetoLake Garda's east-shore wine town at 65 meters, where Corvina and Rondinella grapes have made Bardolino and Chiaretto since the Roman period.

We write about towns like these every Sunday, one town a week, with the photo, the food, the festa. Free, from Pietrasanta.

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