No five-sail seaside resort for Sicily. This is the striking fact of the presentation of the most beautiful and environmentally performing seaside locations present in the guide on The Most Beautiful Sea 2024 drawn up, as per tradition, by Legambiente and the Italian Touring Club.
Pantelleria loses two sails, Santa Marina Salina one
The Pantelleria area of Trapani loses two sails, going from five to 3 banners due to a series of questionable tourist interventions and excessive land consumption which have cost the island in the province of Trapani dearly. The Messina-based Santa Marina Salina on the island of Salina loses a sail – going from five to 4 banners – for having recorded a decline, albeit slight, in general values. Last year these two locations were among the small elite of the five-sail boats.
21 marine and 12 lake tourist locations were awarded
Crystal clear waters, unique places for their scenic beauty, attentive to sustainability but also to the protection of biodiversity. These are the Italian seaside resorts where the Cinque Vele of Legambiente and Touring Club Italiano fly. 21 marine tourist municipalities and 12 lakeside resorts have been awarded the important banner and rewarded today in Rome on the occasion of the presentation of the guide Il Mare più bello 2024, edited by the environmentalist association and the Italian Touring Club. The guide collects tourist information and environmental characteristics of the municipalities in Cinque Vele, including the commitment to protecting the Caretta caretta turtles.
Pollica leads the top five
Leading the top five for 2024 is Pollica, Acciaroli and Pioppi, (Sa) the Cilento municipality located within the Cilento Antico district, in Campania. In second place is the municipality of Nardò, in the province of Lecce in the Apulian district of the Alto Salento Ionico, followed by Baunei, in the province of Nuoro on the eastern Sardinian coast. Fourth place for the Domus De Maria locality on the Chia coast, also in Sardinia, and fifth place for Castiglione della Pescaia, in the Tuscan Maremma area.
Sardinia leads among the regions
At a regional level, Sardinia is by far the region with the most municipalities awarded with the Cinque Vele: alongside Baunei (Nu) and Domus de Maria (South Sardinia) there are also the municipalities of Cabras (Or), Santa Teresa di Gallura (Ss), San Teodoro (Ss) Posada (Nu), Bosa (Or). Followed by Tuscany which, in addition to Castiglion della Pescaia (Gr), includes the municipalities of Capraia Isola (Li), Isola del Giglio (Gr), Capalbio (Gr) and Marina di Grosseto (Gr); then Campania with a group of municipalities all in the province of Salerno: the first place is joined by the municipalities of San Giovanni a Piro (Sa), Castellabate (Sa) and San Mauro Cilento (Sa). Three Cinque Vele municipalities for Puglia with Nardò (Le), Vieste (Fg) and Gallipoli (Le) and a flag also for Liguria, with the three municipalities of the Cinque Terre (Riomaggiore, Vernazza in Monterosso al Mare in the province of La Spezia ) and Basilicata with Maratea (Pz).
Thirty-three municipalities friendly to sea turtles
New this year, also present in the Il Mare più bello guide, are the 33 mutual friends of sea turtles marked with the “turtle” symbol and where the sails of Legambiente and Touring Club Italiano fly. From Maratea to the Tremiti islands, from San Teodoro to Gaeta passing through Silvi, Caorle and Castiglione della Pescaia, just to name a few. These are those administrations which, through a specific memorandum of understanding, have undertaken to adopt a series of measures to make the beaches welcoming also for turtles that lay their eggs as well as for bathers. To date, a total of 74 municipalities throughout Italy (Campania currently leads the ranking with 22 municipalities) have signed the protocol, of which 33 are those in which the sails of Legambiente and Touring Club Italiano also fly. The “municipalities friends of turtles” initiative is part of the Life TURTLENEST project which aims to protect the nesting habitats of the Caretta caretta by increasing the chances of reproductive success and taking into account climate and anthropization. Born thanks to the support of the LIFE program of the European Union, the project is coordinated by Legambiente and brings together 13 partners from 3 different countries (Italy, Spain and France). Also on the front line together with the mutual friends of the turtles are the protected areas (34 which have signed the protocol to date), both of which were awarded today in Rome.
Five-sail lakes
It’s a short step from the sea to the lakes. The undisputed queen in this section remain the autonomous provinces of Trentino and Alto Adige in first and second place with the Cinque Vele assigned to the municipality of Molveno (Tn), on the lake of the same name, and to Appiano sulla Strada del Vino (Bz) on Lake Monticolo. Third place for Massa Marittima (Gr), a Maremma town on Lake Accesa, in Tuscany. Followed by Sospirolo (Bl) on Lake Mis, in Veneto, and Avigliana, on the lake of the same name in Piedmont. For the second consecutive year, the town of Scanno (Aq) on the lake of the same name is confirmed as Cinque Vele, a new entry in 2023.
At a regional level, Trentino-Alto Adige confirms itself as the region with the most locations awarded with the sustainability banners, followed jointly by Piedmont and Lombardy.
