"Portofino: a little village
stretching like an arch of the moon around a quiet basin. Never have I
felt the way I did when I walked into that green indefiniteness, with
such a sense of peace and fulfilment". Portofino from Vie Errante by Guy de Maupassant
It was Pliny who first described this stunning natural
area and named it 'Portus Delphini'. This over time was corrupted to
Portofino.
Portofino is a typical fisherman village of the
Ligurian Riviera which has become one of the most renowned tourist spots
in all of Italy, best known in all the world for its tall colored
houses situated in a semicircular formation around the small port and
piazza.
Portofino and the Tigullio Gulf are symbols representing
Italy throughout the world. The coast is a sequence of fashionable resorts
and hotels with their marinas, pastel-colored houses, first-rate sports
facilities and the seductive atmosphere of the Dolce Vita.
But perhaps the most striking thing for the
traveler is the beauty of Portofino's seascapes, with some of the most
celebrated views in Italy, suspended between the intense blue of the sea
and the green mountains.
The area of Portofino boasts an exceptional natural heritage that includes traces of rural and nautical civilizations, splendid
religious architecture, and clusters of rural houses surrounded
by tiny orchards and sections of land planted with grape vines and olive
trees.
The Portofino promontory, which overhangs the
limpid waters of the marine protected area between the Gulfs of
Tigullio and Paradiso, is blanketed with a dense network of trails, among
the best in Italy.
Among forests of chestnuts, evergreen oaks, hazel
trees, and dense maquis, every so often views open onto blue sea,
solitary churches, and olive oil-mills.
But the mountain keeps some of its gems at the water's
edge, set between the rocks: the bay of San Fruttuoso with the splendid Benedictine abbey from the 10th century, Portofino with its
villas and fishing houses clustered around its natural port and the bay
of Paraggi.
These little pieces of paradise are known and visited every
year by the international tourist elite on board sailboats, yachts, and
luxury ships. Unfortunately they are also visited by a lot of tourists,
so the place is very crowded in summertime and during the weekends.
In about 30 minutes from
Portofino, coasting along the west side of the Promontory you reach the
locality of Olmi. At this point you can take the track for Prato, among
olive trees, vines and fruit trees. From here you can walk a good part
of the way looking at the sea, at the small bays (e.g. The English
inlet) of the underlying coast.
There is then a long stretch of
path exposed to the sun among the Mediterranean vegetation which at
first nearly inaccessible and hostile and then surprisingly rich in
colors and scents thanks to myrtles, heathers, strawberry trees and
Holm-oaks. You can walk the stretch of path till the hospitable and out
of the way bay of San Fruttuoso in the shade of the pines, which hide
the sky with their branches.
I advise you to seek out the Val Cava d'Oro in the
woods above. This is an old cave which acted as a deposit where pirates
stashed their loot. The trail that goes from Portofino to San Fruttuoso is also something you should not miss. You can in alternative take a
boat ride to reach San Fruttuoso.
And don't miss a visit to the Brown Castle, there is a
terrace with breathtaking view on both the open sea and the Bay of
Portofino (the pictures in this page are all shot from the terrace). The
Brown Castle was a stronghold of enormous strategic
importance, it watched over the entire Tigullio Gulf and the towns
located along its coast, not to mention the transport routes leading
over the Eastern Ligurian Apennine Mountains.
Flanked by the nearby fortress and
adjacent lookout tower, the stronghold guarded wide stretches of the
Upper Tyrrehnian Sea.
This site became a vital
stronghold fort the protection of vessels and a strategic lookout within
the fortification system defending the Tigullio coastline from covert
landings to Italy's coast.
It was located in a strategic
position for sanitary controls too, which were done to prevent as much
as possible plagues and infections.
Now the Castle is a Portofino municipal property since 1961 and it is the seat of
the offices of the Sea-Park.
Portofino can be very crowded during the high season,
the narrow road to get there is often a long bumper-to-bumper in these
days and you even have electronic info on the
road, telling you the approximate waiting time before you may reach
Portofino.
Visit Portofino in Spring or Autumn, or, better, in a sunny
winter day: you will have a magic place all for yourselves, and, if you
are there in the peak season, take the boat from Santa Margherita Ligure, Rapallo or Camogli instead of driving.
The regular-service bus from Santa Margherita to Portofino comes at intervals of approx. 20 minutes.
Hotels and restaurant prices in Portofino are
really extremely high: if you want to eat on the "piazzetta"
you will pay for the location, the view, and the privilege of doing so.
If you want a restaurant on a budget, but with more than decent quality,
even if not on the waterfront, try a place where the locals go: Trattoria
Concordia, 4, Via del Fondaco, Portofino Mare Phone 0185 269207.
In summertime, on Saturdays, the night boat trip
from Portofino to Genoa is very romantic, a good memory of Italy.
Copycats Portofinos outside Italy:
Portofino has even been recreated in stupendous
detail around the 'harbor' at Tokyo DisneySea in Chiba, Japan, and to
a much lesser extent, the Portofino Bay Resort at Universal Orlando Resort
in Orlando, Florida, but these are just pale copies of the original, as
they are missing the magic of the wooded hills surrounding the original
Portofino in Italy, the blue of the sea as well as the magic of the atmosphere,
of the people, of the food....so, stay with the original Portofino in
Italy!
