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It felt like a vintage British seashore trip, however with extra dependable climate. Toting umbrella, towels, solar cream, water and a cool-box picnic, my husband, son and I became our backs at the marina in Porto Palo, close to Menfi in south-west Sicily, and walked west. About 10 mins on a slender signposted coastal trail introduced us to Le Solette, a half-mile curving golden seashore between rocky outcrops and subsidized via low hills. It’s a lovely spot, with cushy sand and transparent water in hues from turquoise to indigo – however probably the most outstanding factor about it’s not what’s there, however what’s now not.
Seaside hotels in north and central Italy are a extraordinary phenomenon: the sand is generally virtually invisible underneath pairs of sunbeds and matching umbrellas. OK, there may be the benefit of bathrooms and showers, however at what price? I’ve been to hotels in Liguria, in north-west Italy, the place from Easter to September a stroll alongside the entrance gives perspectives now not of the ocean however of the partitions and converting cabins of an unbroken row of seashore stabilimenti.
But quiet, undeveloped seashores can also be discovered – and extra simply in southern Italy, Sardinia and Sicily, and clear of towns. (Mondello, close to Palermo, for instance, additionally has bathing-establishment blight.) One of our favorite spaces is round Menfi – simply an hour and 20 mins’ force south from Sicily’s capital. Many of the city’s older constructions had been destroyed in an earthquake in 1968, so its architectural points of interest are restricted, but it surely’s in one of the vital island’s best food- and wine-producing spaces, so provides nice eating places, farmers’ markets and winery visits.
Even higher, it’s a few miles from a slightly advanced stretch of coast, the place golden sandy seashores – with blue flag standing for almost 20 years – are punctuated with wild, scrubby headlands and small villages. The coast of Tunisia is simply 100 miles away, so much closer than Naples or Rome.
We stayed in a low-rise vacation let, Villa Melograno (sleeps six from €1,430/£1,225 per week) simply outdoor Menfi, taking part in early June temperatures within the mid-20Cs, sea perspectives from the lawn and day-to-day forays to whichever seashore spot took our fancy.
On lazy days we made for the closest: dune-backed Lido Fiori, which has a minimarket, a few fish eating places overlooking the water and a transparent circulation operating throughout its western finish.
For extra bustle, we’d force to the broader sands of Porto Palo, a fishing village with a sensible choice of puts for a night pizza. Getting to Le Solette took extra effort however this was once rewarded with a completely happy day of swimming, sound asleep and snorkelling, with now not a development and infrequently someone else in sight.
The Menfi coast does get busier in August, when Italians from Palermo and the mainland arrive and temperatures leap. Shoulder-season warmth was once best possible (as an advantage, maximum coastal automobile parks don’t get started charging till mid-June). October, with highs between 21 and 25C, additionally sounds interesting.
This being Sicily, there may be lots to do clear of the seashore. The fertile, sun-soaked land round Menfi is understood for olives, vines and greens (in particular the Slow Food-registered spiny artichoke, in season December-April). We loved buying groceries on the Wednesday farmers’ marketplace in Menfi (in prime summer season it’s additionally hung on Friday evenings in Porto Palo) for tomatoes, peppers, aubergines, herbs and salads smelling of southern sunshine, plus cheeses and cured meats.
Olive oils from the 250-year-old Ravidà property north-west of Menfi are prized in a foreign country (and stocked in Waitrose); it provides excursions, tastings and cookery categories. But if we come again in autumn, we’ll head as a substitute to the down-to-earth Casale Abate, which provides a “family olive harvest” (weekends from 26 September-26 October, €250 for 4 other folks together with two nights’ lodging) the place everybody joins in hand-picking the olives, urgent them and tasting the ultra-fresh oil on heat bread.
Younger households would really like a brand new enchantment that opened closing autumn as regards to Casale Abate: on the Ricupa open farm, youngsters will have a pass at amassing eggs, milking cows and goats, choosing fruit and finding out how greens develop.
At the beginning of this century, the Menfi space was once within the early phases of a wine renaissance, revitalising a practice that started sooner than the Romans, flourished below Julius Caesar (whose favorite wine got here from Sicily) however languished within the 20th century as bulk shipments of low-grade plonk was the norm. Now refocused on high quality wines, the realm is being referred to as “Menfishire”, or “Sicily’s Chiantishire”, and its 7,000 hectares produce 40% of the labelled wine that Sicily exports world wide. We attempted the Mandrarossa vineyard, on find out how to Porto Palo, and loved our pick out of 4 wines, with nibbles, on a breathtaking terrace with perspectives out to sea (€30pp). Its plummy, blackberry, peppery 2023 nero d’avola lingered lengthy at the palate, and in my reminiscence.
Another day we employed bicycles from Sanzone in Menfi to journey the well-surfaced former railway line from Menfi to Porto Palo, incomes a big ice-cream every from Gusto Giusto at the major highway into the village. Our son was once so impressed that day after today he cycled east at the similar trail to fulfill us 10 miles away within the port of Sciacca, with its baroque centre and Castello Incantato (grownup €5), a rather mad sculpture park created in 1919 via émigré Filippo Bentivegna returning after an unsatisfied keep in the United States. The best cultural draw round here’s a lot older than that, despite the fact that.
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This yr will see larger than same old crowds on the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, 50 miles east of Menfi, as the city basks in being Italy’s Capital of Culture. So 2025 is a superb time to discuss with as a substitute the extra intensive, if much less intact, ruins of the Greek agreement of Selinunte (grownup €14) based within the 7th century BC. It’s just a 20-minute force from Menfi, so we went one cloudless morning and wandered open-mouthed, and most commonly on my own, from one large destroy towards its backdrop of glowing sea to any other (Temple E is the best-preserved), a relatable grid of streets to the north with the stays of housing and stores, and an acropolis with 5 extra temples. Come lunchtime we had walked miles and had been happy to cave in within the sea-view bar via Poseidon’s temple. (Slightly electrical educate trundles around the web site and is also tempting in prime summer season, despite the fact that it’s just a little expensive at €8pp.)
Though grand in its day, with a inhabitants of 30,000 (or 100,000; mavens disagree), Selinunte had a fairly brief lifestyles, lasting about 240 years. It was once destroyed via Carthaginians in about 250BC, right through the primary Punic warfare, and not rebuilt. Earthquakes, climate and time have since added their depredations.
And there it sits, sun-soaked, wave-lapped and so huge it could take in bus-loads of tourists with out ever feeling crowded. Slightly like this complete, satisfied sea coast.
More puts to consume and sleep
Casale Abate has one- and two-bedroom bungalows with a shared pool 15 mins’ force from the seashore, from €427 per week, on reserving.com
Right on Lido Fiori seashore, Le 4 Stagioni has rooms from €90 B&B and one- and two-bed residences from €100. Its eating place specialises in native fish, paired with wine or Sicilian craft beers.
Salisà is a rather smarter fish eating place simply alongside the seashore, which a few years in the past added non violent new-build lodging amongst fields half of one mile inland, with rooms (from €126 B&B), pool and beneficiant breakfasts.
In the centre of Menfi, La Regina di Alabastro does conventional fish and meat dishes and nice pizzas. Elegant rooms sleep two to 5 from €110 room-only. Hourly buses run in summer season from the city to Porto Palo and Lido Fiori.
