Santa Severa

Generally, when Claudio and I spend longer than a few days in a particular city, we like to do at least one day trip during the holiday. And being in a Mediterranean country like Italy for a week meant that we definitely had to have a day at the beach!

I consulted a few articles online before our trip to Rome in order to get some ideas of interesting beach towns that are easy to visit in a day. Having weighed up the options, we decided that Santa Severa was the one for us - it's only an hour from Rome by train, and it has a castle (always a plus point for me)!

So halfway through our week in Rome, we went along to the train station and travelled over to this town on the Mediterranean Sea. We were a bit surprised by how deserted and unequipped for tourism the town was; the train station building was closed and there were no pavements on the roads leading towards the beach. Obviously, March is not really a month for beach weather, and the beaches in this area of the country are not famous tourist destinations in the way that beaches in the Italian Riviera, Amalfi Coast, Sicily and Sardinia are. All the same, it was surprising that the place was so quiet, but also quite fun to be somewhere that felt so off the beaten track after the previous couple of days we'd spent visiting world-famous attractions.

Our first stop was the town's castle, which was built in the 9th century. It has a nice little museum that we had pretty much to ourselves, and some fantastic views across the turquoise sea. It also has an array of lovely cats! Most of them were very friendly and we had a great time fussing over them!

We then went for a nice stroll along the town's main beach, which is where you get the best views of the castle. There were some repair works going on next to the castle, which did ruin the view slightly, but it was still a picturesque place.

We also walked through the rest of the town, which was very quiet, and stopped for a somewhat disappointing macaroni and cheese at a café.

We finished our time in Santa Severa chilling out at the tranquil beach on the other side of the castle, where Claudio did his best impression of the Little Mermaid!

But by the time we got back to Rome, we weren't quite ready to call it a night yet! So we finished our day off at Giolitti gelateria, with some of the best ice cream we've ever tasted in one of the most beautiful settings.

To conclude, it was fun to break up our holiday in Rome with a bit of time by the sea, and I'd definitely recommend Santa Severa if you like beaches, castles and cats!

The following day, we were back in full-on sightseeing mode. It was time for us to visit one of the Seven Wonders of the World!