We started early in the morning since was a sunny day, to avoid traffic. It wasn’t enough unfortunately thanks to italian very insufficient highway system, we had to wait 3h before arriving there (usually we can drive there without any traffic, in 1h and 30min!).

There was so many people, and the shops were open even if was Sunday, as often happens. We stopped by a nearby ice-cream shop to get a ice-cream cup, since we remember that they make very good one, and indeed! was delicious…!

We went a bit to the seaside even if was still too cold to swim, but still we engaged with some people in a beach-volley match. In the late evening we came back, because we ran out of money to spend so we decided to go back home and have a dinner in-house, rather than going out in one of those restaurant which serve tasteful fish food…. sigh ;-(

Overall though, was a very nice trip and a good way to spend our last sunny sunday.

it was just in front of our holiday village on the Red Sea, when we taveled here a few years back. As you can read, they don’t seem to really care a lot about the tourist health… if you slip on the rocks, drow, scratch your feet on the coral reef, etc, in one word: if you have ANY kind of possible accident there, is your fault!

Clearly I was quite surprised… having such a signpost in the shore just in front of the holiday village isn’t really encouraging! to be honest though, it wasn’t really located in front of my holiday village, but a few meters away on the side, so perhaps that was already “outside the range” of our village…

Indeed the place is very pleasant. Full of pine-woods, the boulevards full of flowers, trees and benches to sit down, maybe eating one of those tasteful ice-creams (don’t miss to try the ones of the famous ice cream shop “La Perla”). All those things make Milano Marittima really a cool place, even just for a short one-day trip (of course if you live nearby like us!).

One of our favourite places is the Thermal Park . In the link you’ll find immediatly an interesting bike route, which pass through some very cool and green areas. Below you can find some of the typical inhabitants of the place:

various dwarf-rabbit that were introduced in the park. Honestly I don’t think it was a very cool move since now they’re breeding like crazy…!

the one above is taking a “nap”

A wonderful peacock that was posing just for us! magnificent colors.

This picture features the dangerous fast-reproducing rate of the dwarf rabbits… indeed as it is well known, those animals couple like crazy ! a pity you can’t see it moving, it was really funny!

A deer eating something on the ground

At last various goats that are looking curiously at my digital camera lens!

The last day, before taking the ferry back home, we did the last trip to the lighthouse, with a bit of nostalgy (to be honest, a lot of nostalgy!). Then when we got back to the port we realized that we had still 2h of time before departure. So we started a tour of the various shops, we got an ice cream, but only 30 minutes had passed. In such moments the time seems to pass so slowly…and then we used the car and we drove back a bit, to a path we saw some days before, to do a quick exploration.

Knowing that we hadn’t much time available we ran through the path quickly, and we were astonished to see a very beautiful spot, completely hidden from the main road!

In a race against the time, pushed from the curiosity to take a closer look, we almost broke a leg and were about to be bitten by a snake that was sleeping in the stones nearby (I didn’t notice if it was a viper or anything else). But in the end we made it! but we were disappointed to see that the shore wasn’t “secret” at all, but a private shore, indeed a huge villa was built just on the seaside…!

In the picture above you can’t see the villa, but you can see the shore. I have to admit that I’m a bit envy anyway, that was our last excursion in our holiday to the “Isola del Giglio”, a really wonderful place that I suggest to visit, but only in low season! I can’t imagine all those small roads and little shores by summer, full of people…!

So, this is the first sight of the path that leads down to the lighthouse… naturally you can’t get there by car, so if you’re a bit lazy… better give up!

you can notice once again the wonderful flowers all around the sides of the path. Really amazing!

this old stone bridge is something unique. Old-looking but still robust, with small grass bushes growing here and there, it was giving to this place an almost “fantasy” atmosphere! maybe also because that day the sky was cloudy, with a grey typical of the scottish/celtic movie settings!

Once past the lighthouse, you could reach the southern extremity of the island, climbing down to the sea with this funny ladder carved into the stone that you can see in the picture above.

Another funny but really wonderful spot to do a pic-nic, or even just a moment of relax, a break from the mundane frenetic life, that seems to be so distant from the chaos you can see in the modern towns… I love that picture pastel colors!

from the wooden table you can see the lighthouse on the distance. As you can see you have to walk for some more meters to get into the “pic-nic” spot, but it is really worth it!

At last, here is a picture of the ladder that climbs down directly into the sea. That day it was really rough (even if doesn’t seem so from the picture above) and it was a bit scary honestly!