Grand Hotel Tremezzo

Of Grand Hotel Tremezzo's three pools, the one to swim in is not on the hotel's land at all. The WOW pool is moored out on Lake Como: a rectangle of bright turquoise in a timber deck, reached by a gangway from the shore, with the lake's darker blue beyond the rail on every side. The hotel behind it went up in 1910, on the site of the old Villa Porcetta, and looks across the water to Bellagio and the Grigne mountains. Five acres of park, planted with olive and palm, come down to T Beach, fine sand under parasols striped orange and white. The third pool is indoors, in the spa, where children are not admitted: an infinity pool beside a row of cream columns, iron scrollwork at their tops and glass between them, with the lake beyond.

Recommended for couples after a grand hotel of the old school with a spa kept for grown-ups, and for families: the Terrace Garden and Rooftop Grand suites each take two adults and two children, and there is babysitting rather than a kids club. The day belongs on the water, from jetties where vintage speedboats tie up between candy-striped poles, a varnished launch named Ruy among them; Bellagio is ten minutes across, Varenna fifteen, and Villa Carlotta's garden three minutes away on foot. Guests praise the food from the terrace down to the wood-fired pizza by the Flower Pool, and the terrace is where to book a table. La Terrazza Gualtiero Marchesi is the only restaurant anywhere still cooking Marchesi's own dishes: Riso, oro e zafferano, the saffron risotto finished with gold leaf, and Dripping di pesce, his tribute to Jackson Pollock, where the spill is the point.