(soft gentle music) - There are places around the world that call to travelers in a deeper way.

For some, that calling is to a place we come from but have never been.

For me, the fatherland is Italy, Southern Italy to be exact in a region called Calabria.

So when my daughter Lauren was allowed to pick a family trip for her high school graduation gift and chose the exact opposite end of Italy from where the Aiellos come from, we knew that ancestral calling to the toe of the boot would have to wait and started our adventure touching down in Milan.

After 12 hours of wonderful air travel from Los Angeles, we're gonna work our way through the airport now.

This journey will take us into the foothills of the Italian Alps to Lake Como, to wander the streets of Bellagio.

Tight fit.

And toward the lake by private boat.

Absolutely beautiful, the town of Varenna.

We'll slip through the waterways of Venice and take an early morning stroll before this island city wakes.

Good way to get a lay of the land and explore without the crowds.

We'll spend a lot of time in a rental car, watching unfamiliar landscapes pass by, eager to get to the next destination in a power-packed week of exploring that will take us to the suburbs of Genoa, where the blue waters of the Mediterranean provide relief in the sounds of cicadas and a brutal August heat wave.

And even though a vacation like this is a lot of work in itself, there are always moments where things slow down, when a view stops you cold.

- That's way worth the five euros.

- [Jeff] Or when laughter cannot be contained.

- Going on there?

(Jill laughing) - [Jeff] That makes sharing time like this together in a place like Northern Italy, something to be treasured long after the return trip home.

Seeing this up here is a great thing.

(laughs) Teaching the lessons of appreciation and discovering new places isn't going to be easy, but Italy has a way of catching your eye and imaginations if you're ready to let it in.

(speaking in foreign language) - [Lauren] Beautiful body.

(laughs) - [Jeff] When you travel, the world becomes a smaller place.

- Pretty incredible stuff.

- [Jeff] When you explore with friends like mine that are outdoor cinematographers, destinations definitely come to life.

Okay, that was loud.

We share our love of travel with our cameras, telling the stories of earth's most amazing places in every frame.

But on every adventure, the unplanned moments are the ones we remember the most.

I did bring a bag of raw chicken.

Hang on, I'll be right back.

- What's up?

- Here we go, Lake Como.

I'm Jeff Aiello.

Tall bridge.

And this is "Outside: Beyond The Lens."

It's not always about the obvious big view behind you.

Sometimes, the prettiest things are right below your feet.

- [Announcer] Production funding for "Outside: Beyond The Lens" is provided by Visit Fresno County, nature diversity found in the heart of California Central Valley.

From Fresno and Clovis, you can drive to three nearby national parks.

By Hedrick's Chevrolet.

- Hedrick's Chevrolet is proud to support the spirit of travel in each of us.

Every journey has a first step.

Adventures start here.

- [Announcer] By Advanced Beverage Company, serving Bakersfield and Kern County for over 50 years, supporting Valley PBS in the wonders of travel.

By the Penstar Group, promoting opportunity and growth through business for collaborations and partnerships for the future.

By Hodges Inc., providing backup power for your most needed lights and appliances during power outages.

And by Visit Yosemite Madera County, California's gateway to Yosemite National Park, outdoor adventures, and much more.

(light music) - [Jeff] It seems so surreal to finally be on the ground in Italy, the land from which my father's side of the family comes from after years of dreaming about making my first trip here - home.

I saved this one for a family adventure, leaving Zach and David behind, but excited to share this eight-day road trip through Northern Italy with Jill, Lauren, and Jet.

After an almost uneventful series of flights to get to Milan, we are in the rental car now headed north for the one-hour drive to spectacular Lake Como.

If the lack of sleep in 13 hours of air travel overnight sounds exhausting, then driving along the western shoreline of Lake Como is the adrenaline boost we all need.

The shockingly narrow roads, colorful villages, and glimpses of the massive lake mixed with daredevil pedestrian foot traffic keeps both hands firmly on the wheel and most of my dulled senses as sharp as is possible in our current state of awareness.

Lake Como is one of Italy's top tourism destinations, nestled in the foothills of the Italian Alps.

At 56 square miles in size, it is Italy's third largest lake, with a meandering shoreline dotted with small towns and stunning villas.

We've decided to stay in vacation rental homes for this trip instead of hotels, and finally arrived in Tremezzo at day's end.

With bags dropped in our lakeside apartment, we waste no time in getting a table at a restaurant downstairs.

All right, everybody's smoke tired.

We're all jet lagged.

We're sitting here on the shores of Lake Como.

There it is out there pretty.

It's a little hot, isn't it?

And we are waiting for the delicious pizza to cool.

It just came out, this is our second one.

This is our second margherita pizza.

Kids, you can tell I've been on the plane a long time.

13 hours, huh?

Lauren, did you order an Aperol Spritz?

- No, I did.

- Oh, okay.

- Sorry.

(laughs) - With the hot August sun finally slipping from the sky and the troops crashed out on the couch, early evening settles over the Alps as pastel colors paint soft frames of Lake Como in the changing light.

The big lift of getting here safe is over.

Tomorrow, we explore.

(soft gentle music) Morning brings anticipation of waking up somewhere new.

Air conditioning isn't something typically found in the homes along Lake Como, so when historically hot temperatures bake the usually mild climate here overnight, sleep is tough to get.

Since it's actually cooler outside at sunrise, Lauren and I take a lakeside stroll to get better acquainted with this part of heaven.

A walk along the shoreline in Tremezzo gives us a look at life on the lake before the world wakes up and the bustle of activity short to follow.

With everyone up and at 'em now and the forecasted 100 degree heat approaching, we head out for our first big excursion across the lake to the most famous of towns on Lake Como - Bellagio.

Alright, so now, we are headed to the town of Bellagio, which is sort of the peninsula that makes the Y-shape of Lake Como.

And we're gonna look for a water taxi and take a little ride across from Tremezzo, where we're staying, across the lake over to Bellagio, which is supposed to have great shopping, great food, sort of known for risotto, which is cool 'cause who doesn't like risotto?

Team Aiello is behind me.

Doing pretty good.

August is a busy month to come to Italy, popular with tourists from around the world and the month most Italians take their holiday too.

So a place like Lake Como can be double whammied with vacationers.

The upper part of Bellagio is lined with narrow streets, where people and cars co-exist in a kind of controlled chaos that you see throughout Europe.

Tight fit.

We quickly find a side alleyway back down the hill where we can downshift the gears a bit and try to take in the charm, history, and beauty found here away from the crowds.

My son Jet and I feel like we're good with the whole Bellagio thing after about an hour.

But one last shot pulls Jill and Lauren in with its tractor beam of glass figurines and purses, so I know we're not making that 2:20 boat back to Tremezzo.

Lauren, what do you see that you really like?

What do you gotta have?

- The cat earrings.

- [Jeff] Cat earrings?

- I have to get the black cat to match my purse.

- Show me.

- Kitty purse right there.

Oh.

(speaking foreign language) Beautiful body.

- The water taxis run nonstop in and out of Bellagio, so catching the next boat isn't gonna be a problem.

Lake Como is a beautiful place to visit, and already, I can see that planning more than two full days here is highly recommended to give yourself a chance to really settle into the experience of this magical place.

For our last day in Lake Como, we decided to change things up and do something I read about last night online.

We're boat people, and Lake Como has boats.

I found a place to rent our own boat for a few hours to take a tour of the lake on our terms, away from the crowds and sardine-packed ferries.

Yes, it did come with some risks, like walking the two miles from Tremezzo to find the boat rental place.

But the bakeries and cafes along the way balanced out the brief bursts of sheer terror walking along the SS340.

Okay, so this is kind of the way I like to see lakes, on our own private boat.

We just chartered a nice little, looks like a 16-foot little center console boat we're taking out right now, and super easy.

It was about 250 euros with insurance for three hours, and the boat has GPS on it.

It's got a Bimini top on it to get the sun off of us.

And we've got food on board, a fresh croissant, and the kids.

Lauren's getting excited because we are getting close to what?

The Star Wars.

We call it the Star Wars villa, but it's Villa Balbianello.

I say it with a little Italian flair like that because that's just kind of natural.

I'm just now seeing the edges of it start to pop up here.

So this is where they filmed "Attack of the Clones," if you're a Star Wars nerd, like regular viewers of this show know that I am and my daughter Lauren is, so this is really exciting.

(light music) Villa Balbianello is one of the most striking estates on all of Lake Como.

It sits on the point of a peninsula near the town of Lenno, in the Lombardy region of Italy.

Once a monastery in the 1700s, the Villa is now owned by the National Trust of Italy and is one of the most visited sites in that system.

Tourism to Villa Balbianello exploded after its famous terraced gardens and exteriors were used as a backdrop in "Star Wars: Attack of the Clones," where Anakin Skywalker steals a kiss from Padme Amidala overlooking the placid waters of the lake.

The villa was also featured in the James Bond film, "Casino Royale," where an injured 007 rusted up before leaving on another mission.

Having our own boat gives us a chance to spend time below the villa, reliving scenes from our favorite movies, as well as a quick stop on land to tour the grounds on foot for a dream come true experience we'll never forget.

Lake Como is massive, so the three hour rental period is just long enough to tour the middle regions of the lake.

That's a fun way to see some of the lakeside villas up close and to cruise by picturesque towns like Varenna.

Varenna sits like an artist's painting, its colored structures reflecting in the calm morning waters of Lake Como, nestled below steep hillsides that stretched to the distant Italian Alps.

Our tour of the lake is perfect.

The intimacy of spending time like this as a family in a way we're accustomed to back home temporarily allows us to forget that we're tourists here as we enjoy the true essence of what makes Lake Como a must-see Italian destination.

There's not big fish in this lake.

No, there's no sharks.

(Jill speaking indistinctly) (Lauren screaming) - What is that, Jet?

How did you jump like such a... - With Lake Como and the Alps slowly shrinking in the distance, we head to our next stop to one of Italy's most iconic cities - Venice.

Driving in cities and towns in Italy is an entirely different experience.

Short and intense burst of terror, narrow streets mixed in with a nonstop onslaught of aggressive moped riders buzzing like angry murder hornets around your head will test even the most skilled drivers and even tempers.

Nevertheless, about four hours after leaving Lake Como, we arrive at a parking garage on the outskirts of Venice to hop on a water taxi and try and find our vacation rental in this maze of canals, humanity, and red tile roofing.

To get to Venice, if you rent a car, you have to do this.

Right, Jet?

- Yeah.

- Park in the parking garages here.

We've got a ton of parking out here.

We are in the Tronchetto parking.

Always a lot of availability.

You can reserve parking in Venice before you come.

We just decided to do the first come first serve thing.

Plenty of spaces here.

Now, we're gonna unpack.

We're gonna go over to the people mover.

You kind of see right behind me right there?

That'll take us into Venice.

We'll get onto a water taxi and get to our destination.

Where driving can be hit or miss, depending on where you are, parking in Italy is a straight up nightmare, consistently.

Spaces are laughably small and difficult to navigate.

Okay, let me move this stuff out of the way.

Put that down there.

We're not gonna bring that.

We're just bringing what we need into Venice.

- All right.

- You got our bags?

Just got our bags all out.

That's kind what, yeah, I put her too close.

I put her too close.

We figure out the ticketing system for the water taxis and climb aboard.

COVID protocols were still in effect when we took this trip but have since relaxed.

After landing on the waterfront near St. Mark's Square in the heart of Venice, we found it confusing and fairly overwhelming to understand which water taxi to get on next since we weren't really sure where we were going.

It cost a little more, but the ticket was to go straight to a private charter boat, which there are many.

Show the skipper the address to our apartment, hand him 60 euros, and sit back to enjoy the ride.

These luxury boats are beautifully maintained and skimming under the bridges of Venice like this was totally worth the extra money.

Venice is a city built on a group of 126 small islands in a lagoon of the Adriatic Sea.

Over 260,000 people live here, but an almost constant stream of tourism makes it feel bigger than that.

Known for its intricate canal system connected by 472 bridges, Venice is a wonderful labyrinth of paths, alleys, and squares.

We stick close to our apartment the first night to get a feel for the neighborhood we'll be in for two days and are instantly absorbed into the fabric of this historic place and its charm that glows from within.

The energy of Venice at night is replaced with an almost eerie calm at daybreak.

This is not a city of morning people, and for me, that's fine, because walking these quiet streets before anyone wakes up is an opportunity to understand Venice before it's had a chance to put its makeup on.

The natural beauty and symmetry here, where canals and bridges and colors and time worn on these walls all combined into frames that now wait to be captured without the parade of distractions soon to come.

You cannot come to Venice and not visit St. Mark's Square.

The GPS on our phones guide us through a maze of humanity, shops, a pickpocket from Senegal, and a slew of eateries.

Emerging into the square for the first time brings the struggle of reconciling what you thought this place would be against what it actually is.

I had grossly underestimated its size.

With an afternoon thunderstorm beginning to hit, we head back out to the waterfront to grab a boat back to the apartment.

Our time in Venice was short, and I personally fell in love with this place.

So coming back for an extended stay is definitely on my new list of travel things to do.

Like a lot of vacations planned for Italy, we planned too much with big drive days and an even bigger map of destinations to hit.

We're back on the Autostrada now, headed all the way across the country to the west coast of Italy, just south of Genoa on the Italian Riviera.

This poke took nearly five hours but was an easy drive through the agricultural belt of Italy and into the northern reaches of Tuscany.

For this part of the trip, I've picked out our own villa in the town of Recco, a southern suburb of the port city of Genoa, right on the cliffs overlooking the Mediterranean sea.

Once we get settled into this beautiful seaside villa, the Riviera vibes begin to sink in.

The sounds of cicadas, a large beetle-like insect known for making a racket when they're present, fills the hot summer air, driving the kids and I toward the sea.

The coastline south of Genoa is almost too breathtaking to describe with words.

Seaside tourism towns like Camogli cater to the international visitors and Italians alike.

In the hills above, winding roads lead to mountaintop towns like San Lorenzo della Costa, watching over the Mediterranean and larger cities like Rappalo below.

It's on this route we find ourselves now, headed to a place I've always wanted to visit along this section of the Italian Riviera, the picture postcard-perfect, Portofino.

I will leave this warning for you now.

There are several ways to get to Portofino, and driving there is probably the last way I'd choose again.

The wait for the ferry was too long for us, and private boat charters were sold out.

So short of parachuting in, we took the more dangerous option of driving ourselves.

- [Lauren] How are you gonna get it out?

- I'm gonna figure this out.

Driving into Portofino is not for the faint of heart.

Parking in Portofino is not for the- - [Lauren] Skinny (laughs).

- Not for a larger guy, I guess.

- [Lauren] Yes.

(laughing) Stupid.

- Over the years, Portofino has become a resort destination for Europe's jet set crowd.

The PBS series, "Hotel Portofino" has filmed on location here, bringing a new crop of tourists in to wander these quaint streets and shops.

One of the must-see points of interest in Portofino is Castello Brown, a 16th-century castle overlooking this paradise on the Riviera.

This castle served as a defensive position, providing overwatch of Portofino for hundreds of years, and was later sold to the City of Portofino in 1969.

Today, it is open to the public and is still furnished with historic art pieces and incredible views of Italy's northern coast below.

Today, mega yachts and small fishing boats share the pristine harbor as visitors stroll the waterfront, bringing the summertime energy of Portofino to life.

Back in the villa near Recco now, and thinking about the long trip home we will begin tomorrow.

Travel to Italy was a reward for Lauren and the hard work she put into her high school years.

But the life lessons learned when you make travel like this a priority go well beyond anything that can be taught in a classroom.

Travel, exploring, venturing out beyond what you know brings each of us lifelong learning and appreciation of other places and the people that live there.

These experiences truly do make the world feel like a smaller place.

Capturing the memories and experiences of a trip like this in camera not only documents the journey to enjoy later, but it just might also inspire future generations, ones you may never get the chance to meet, to follow in the footsteps of a legacy of travel, connecting families to their roots in a better understanding of where we all come from.

A connection that will always help guide us to where life's journey takes us next.

(soft gentle music) (speaking in foreign language) - [Announcer] Production funding for "Outside: Beyond the Lens" is provided by Visit Fresno County, nature diversity found in the heart of California Central Valley.

From Fresno and Clovis, you can drive to three nearby national parks.

By Hedrick's Chevrolet.

- Hedrick's Chevrolet is proud to support the spirit of travel in each of us.

Every journey has a first step.

Adventures start here.

- By Advance Beverage Company, serving Bakersfield and Kern County for over 50 years.

From our family to yours, supporting Valley PBS in the wonders of travel.

By the Penstar Group, promoting opportunity and growth for collaboration and partnerships for the future.

By Hodges, Inc.

Battery Storage Systems.

Would you rather invest in the power company's infrastructure or your own?

And by Visit Yosemite Madera County, California's gateway to Yosemite National Park.

Explore the outdoor magic of Madera County and be inspired to discover more.

(light music)