Hi there, Iam hoping to take my kids 12 and 14 to Italy for our first family Europe trip. I’m a single mom so I’m hoping for max two accommodations in a week (7-10days) If you had to chose a town or city to go to that is close to nice beaches, water and provides some culture and city what would you suggest.
Posted by
Bend, Oregon
2671 posts
What time of year?
Posted by
OP
2 posts
We haven’t booked anything but thinking May 2026
Posted by
1267 posts
May could still be chilly for swimming, depending on when you go. You're not going to get a combo of beach and culture. Most beaches have a beachy culture or a Italian fishing village culture. I'd say your best bet would be to go to the Cinque Terre, Florence and Venice, or two of those if you are there for 7 days. Venice has a beach (lido) that you could visit one day, but it also has such a unique environment oriented around water (between taking the vaporato down the central canal, or taking a water taxi from the airport to Venice, or taking a ferry from Venice to an outlying island (Murano) for a day trip), and everywhere you go you can sit and put your feet in the water while you eat a picnic lunch, and so on. In the Cinque Terre, the town of Manarola has a big rock in the harbor that people "cliff jump" from (my 12 yo son enjoyed this), and Monterosso has a beach, so staying in either of these for a few nights would give you a swim opportunity. If I had ten days (or 9, and ten nights) I'd fly into Venice and out of Florence or Pisa (depending on what flights work best), and plan nights like 3, 2, 4 if Venice, CT, Florence, (or 3, 3, 3, or 4, 2, 3 depending on when you arrive and depart from each - for example, if you arrive at night, I'd give Venice 4 nights so you have 3 full days, etc).
Posted by
5671 posts
Sea is just beginning to warm up in late May--kids would probably be impervious to cold. But you should look at various flights and choose the destination first, then you can add on a coastal component. Puglia might be a good choice.
Posted by
8736 posts
We lived in Augsburg, Germany for four years and tried a beach vacation in two places in Europe, Rimini, Italy on the Adriatic and The South of France at Cannes and that area.
The Rimini beach was borderline awful. The beach us not clean, the water had a bit of an odor. I don't recommend that area. Cannes and that area was Ok. The beach was nothing to brag about compared to what we have seen in Florida or California, but it was not nasty . Still, it was crowded and frankly just didn't do the job for us. We had three teens that wanted a beach, and they were not overwhelmed by either.
Posted by
San Francisco Bay Area (USA)
16486 posts
Palermo: Mondello beach district.
Naples Area: Sorrento or Amalfi Coast (Naples is a large port city and not a place to swim in the water).
Venice area: Venezia Lido has beaches, not the Caribbean, but you can work with it.
Everything else is too cumbersome to reach from the US on a short trip like yours.