Veteran travel advisor Angela Porcellato returned to Italy in spring 2025 and came home with the same quiet certainty she always does — that no country on earth compares, and that most travelers are still missing its best-kept secrets.
At a Glance
Verona and Sirmione on Lake Garda are underrated Italian destinations that rival Venice and Florence. Verona offers the Arena di Verona for summer opera, excellent food, and the beautiful Piazza Bra, while Sirmione provides thermal waters, medieval architecture, and lakeside charm—both reward slow travel and deeper exploration beyond standard itineraries.
There is a version of Italy that everyone knows. Venice and its canals, Rome and its ruins, Florence and its galleries. It is a greatest-hits itinerary that has sent millions of travelers home satisfied, sun-kissed, and slightly overwhelmed by gelato. And then there is the Italy that Angela Porcellato knows. The one that starts in Venice with family, winds through the ancient stones of Verona, slips quietly along the shores of Lake Garda, and climbs into the dramatic silence of the Dolomites. It is a different Italy entirely, and Porcellato has made it her personal mission to make sure her clients find it.
In spring 2025, the seasoned travel advisor made her way back to the country that has never once let her down, visiting family in Venice before setting her sights on the destinations that, in her view, deserve far more attention than they receive. Chief among them: Verona.
The Case for Verona
Ask Porcellato about the highlight of her trip and she does not hesitate. "I keep telling people to go see Verona," she says with the kind of enthusiasm that comes not from a brochure but from someone who has stood in the piazza and felt it. "It is so underrated. You can spend an easy two or three nights there, take in a concert right there at the Amphitheatre, the Piazza — the square there is gorgeous, the shops are incredible, the food is the best. Just love Verona."
That amphitheater she references is the Arena di Verona, a Roman structure that has stood for nearly two thousand years and still hosts world-class opera and concerts under the open sky each summer. It is the kind of experience that exists nowhere else on earth, and yet Verona consistently loses the spotlight to its more famous Italian neighbors. For Porcellato, that is both a missed opportunity for travelers and a source of genuine advocacy. She has been to Verona before. She went back. That says everything.
The city rewards those who linger. The Piazza Bra, stretching wide in front of the Arena, draws locals and visitors alike into its natural rhythm of walking, shopping, and sitting over long meals. The food, Porcellato insists, is among the best she has had in the country, which, coming from someone who has eaten her way across Italy more than once, is a serious endorsement.
A Hidden Gem Along the Lake
Beyond Verona, Porcellato also made time for a destination that rarely appears on the standard Italy itinerary. Sirmione, a slender peninsula jutting into the shimmering waters of Lake Garda, caught her attention for all the right reasons. "A hidden gem is definitely Sirmione along Lake Garda — Lago di Garda," she says. "It is literally a hidden gem."
Compact and atmospheric, Sirmione is the kind of place that rewards slow travel. Thermal waters, a medieval castle rising at the water's edge, narrow lanes lined with trattorias and boutiques — it is a scene that feels almost too beautiful to be real, and yet it remains largely off the radar for travelers who funnel straight from Milan to Florence without looking west. For Porcellato, discovering or rediscovering places like Sirmione is part of what makes the work of a travel advisor meaningful. It is not just about booking flights. It is about knowing where the magic hides.
Italy, Again and Again
What is perhaps most striking about Porcellato's relationship with Italy is not any single destination but the cumulative effect of returning, time after time, and finding it still exceeds expectation. For a professional who has traveled widely and advises clients on destinations across the globe, that consistency is remarkable. "What surprises me every time," she reflects, "is that no matter how many places I visit, it just confirms that Italy remains the most beautiful country to me."
This is not the wide-eyed declaration of a first-time visitor. It is a considered verdict from someone who has seen enough of the world to know the difference. And that is precisely what gives it weight. Clients who hear Porcellato speak about Italy are not hearing a sales pitch. They are hearing a conclusion she has reached again and again, across multiple trips and multiple seasons, tested against everything else the world has to offer.
Her answer to who should make the journey is equally expansive. "Whether you love history, art, food, wine, beautiful scenery, charming villages, or simply immersing yourself in a different culture," she says, "Italy has something for everyone." It is a broad claim, but Porcellato backs it with specifics, and that combination of sweep and detail is what separates genuine expertise from enthusiasm.
What You Cannot Learn from a Website
There is a particular kind of knowledge that only comes from being somewhere. Porcellato understands this better than most, and she communicates it with characteristic directness. "You have to see it to believe it," she says. "You hear so many beautiful things about all these different cities, but until you go yourself and experience it, that is when you will be in awe."
For her clients, the value of that firsthand experience is practical as much as philosophical. Porcellato now books Verona with a specific checklist in mind. She researches which concerts or performances are scheduled at the Arena during a client's dates. She arranges the tickets. She identifies and reserves a restaurant that will turn a good evening into an unforgettable one. She layers in tours that bring the history to life. None of that is possible without having been there, having felt the energy of the piazza at dusk, and knowing exactly what makes a Verona evening sing.
It is the difference between a travel advisor and a travel agent, between someone who has lived the experience and someone who has read about it. Porcellato is firmly, unapologetically in the former category, and her clients are the better for it.
Your Italy, Made Personal
Spring in Italy is a particular kind of beautiful. The light is softer, the crowds thinner, the pace a little more forgiving. It is when the country reveals itself most generously to those who know how to look. Porcellato arrived in that light, visited family in Venice, walked streets she had walked before in Verona and found them just as stunning, and discovered Sirmione as the kind of quiet reward that seasoned travelers prize above all others.
She came home, as she always does, with the same conviction: Italy is extraordinary, and most people have only scratched its surface. For those who are ready to go deeper, to swap the predictable itinerary for something more personal and more surprising, Porcellato is ready to build it. The concert at the Arena, the table at the right restaurant, the detour to a lakeside village that most travelers drive past without knowing what they are missing. "You have to see it to believe it," she says. And with the right advisor, seeing it has never been easier.
