The summits of Lake Como

The most scenic summits around Lake Como, from San Primo to Monte Grona and the Resegone, with grade, duration and elevation gain.

Around Lake Como the summits are low, almost all of them under 2,000 metres, but the view they offer is out of all proportion to their height, because the lake surrounds them on three sides and the Alps close the horizon to the north.

This page gathers the peaks we have climbed in the Triangolo Lariano, the Lecco area and on the western shore, from the Croce di Muggio, reached in an hour and a half, to the Resegone ridge for experienced hikers.

The Resegone and its neighbours

Among the peaks on this page there is one that almost every Italian knows without ever having climbed it. The Resegone takes its name from its jagged ridge, like a saw, the résega of the Lombard dialect, and Alessandro Manzoni describes it in the opening pages of The Betrothed for exactly that row of points, so that its profile has become the very image of Lecco. The Via delle Creste Orientali, for experienced hikers, runs close along those towers, and it is the most direct way to understand why the mountain is called what it is.

On the other side of the lake, in the Triangolo Lariano, the highest point is Monte San Primo, a little over 1,680 metres, which presides over the promontory between the lake's two southern arms. These are low summits, and for that very reason the weather matters more than the altitude: in summer the haze from the plain can hide the Alps by mid-morning, while the clearest days often come in autumn and winter, after the north winds have passed through. On these peaks, then, choosing the day matters as much as choosing the route.