It was a toss up between two houses when i was looking for an apartment at Lake Como, the view won! This house in up hill as opposed to right on the water, hence the view is breathtaking. Although i would recommend that you get a rental car if you want to stay here, i did see people walking up and down, but a car would make your stay here very convenient.
The house itself is spotless, three bedrooms, large living room and dining room, two terraces and garden....everything you could possibly ask for to enjoy your lake vacation. Barrie is a great host, easy to connect with when we had questions but left us alone to enjoy when we were all settled.
Short drive to downtown Menaggio, where all the restaurants, gelateria, ferry dock, boat rentals are, super convenient. We think Menaggio is a very good base for us to explore lake Como, it's relatively smaller than Bellagio and Varenna, but we like that "live like local" feeling, especially after the last ferry left, it's very very nice. And i have to mention that it's very safe and kids friendly, we traveled with our 5 year old, she had so much fun and the girl at ice-cream shop knew her by name:))
Other than all the villages, a few activities that i'd highly recommend:
1. rent a boat from AC boat rental (right in Menaggio) to drive on the lake, we did it twice because it's that good, priced reasonably
2. if you are golfer, check out the Menaggio golf course on the hills, you could rent all the gears at a reasonable price, we did 9 holes and it was fantastic!
We enjoyed our stay so much that we miss it already!