Sandy, you posted of bunch of questions on the Switzerland Forum, many questions were about Italy, and you have now deleted those. It sounded like your original plan was to fly to Zurich, drive/train to Como, then Dolomites, Florence, Tuscany, etc.
Why don't you post a new question on the General Europe Forum. Put in the date and place you want to start, the day and place you want to leave from, and what you want to see and stay in between. Then we can get the whole picture and make suggestions. You also seemed to indicate some trepidation about driving on twisty mountain roads. You can't find a much more twisty mountain road than the Stelvio Pass. People come from all over the world to relish the white-knuckle experience of driving it in the summer.
Back to your question. If you were starting in Zurich, you might travel by train from Zurich to Chur, then take the Bernina Express train to Tirano, Italy, with plenty of Alpine scenery as it goes over the Alps. There it is a 1 1/2 hour train ride to Varenna on lake Como. That is a very good place to experience Lake Como, either there or a short ferry ride across to Bellagio.
You can then get a train from Varenna by way of Milan to Bolzano. Bolzano has its own issues in the summer as it has a reputation for being very hot, and it is not the best place to experience the Dolomites. That would be, IMO, Val Gardena town of Ortisei. You can get there by bus from Bolzano easily. Or you could rent a car in Bolzano, but even then you will have some of those twisty mountain roads to deal with, just not as twisty as going over Stelvio Pass.
