Expert: Edoardo Date: 7/3/2008 Subject: 18 year olds in Italy
Question My son and his friend would like to spend about a week in Italy this August near a beach. I realize it is the busiest time of year, but where would you recommend that is not overun with tourists? They like all water sports and good food.
Answer Hello,
you are right, it's very very crowded everywhere in Italy, all Italians make their vacation in August so everywhere you have lanes and crowds.
In this cases the selection is made by the budget, the more you raise the budget the less crowds you find, but this doesn't go along very well with the young age of your son; expensive places are taken by people who usually have a certain age and social position, which can be very boring for a teenager who jsut would like to have some fun.
Anyway, trying to give you an answer I could say that the beaches on the Est Coast are very crowded, but very cheap and full of life. Also the service is incredibly good compared to the price.
I'm talking about the riviera romagnola, so where Rimini, Riccione, Cesenatico etc. are (you land in Bologna or Rimini airport).
A wise solution could be moving on the same coast but slightly southern, so reaching Marche/Abruzzi where you still have very very nice places, good prices and not big crowds. So some names could be in the region of Marche (riviera del Conero is the most famous and beautiful, refer to ANCONA there's also an airport), than southern at the S.Benedetto del Tronto area, and than in Abruzzo, check Pineto, Roseto, and all the little villages of the Abruzzo coast close to Pescara.. all the south to Molise, Petacciato a very nice place, Blue Flag (cleanest sea & beaches)for the Italian assotiation.
On the west coast, I'd say Tuscany or Cinque terre, but you do need to pay close attention to the places, because some of them, like Talamone in Tuscany are only for VIPs and prices are very high. In Tuscany I'd say Follonica, Castiglione della Pescaia, or the Isola del Giglio and Isola d'Elba. Ahhh.. almost forgot before to mention the TREMITI islands in the Est coast, you can take a ferry from Petacciato or Pescara (molise).
