Field Report No. 07 · Family trip
Sestri Levante Liguria, Italy
Our favorite beach town in Italy, and the best pesto of Jamey's life. Where Italians vacation, not tourists. Do Cinque Terre from a boat and come back here for dinner.
Field Report
No. 07
Family trip
Sestri Levante Liguria, Italy
Worth the flight.
- Coordinates
- 44.2710° N, 9.3920° E
- Traveled
- Late June
- Kid-readiness
- High. A calm, shallow crescent bay made for kids, a walkable old town, and gelato every night. The easiest beach week we've had in Italy.
- Where we stayed
- Hotel Miramare & Spa, the Suite Sea View, right on the water with the bay below. Not cheap, a real splurge, and half the magic of the trip. Book the hotel's beach service with the room; the beach is small and reservation-only in summer.
- The non-negotiable
- Swimming the Baia del Silenzio, the 'Bay of Silence.' A calm crescent cove ringed by pastel buildings, warm and shallow, the prettiest water we've put the kids in.
- What we'd skip
- Walking the Cinque Terre villages in peak season. Cool to see once, completely overrun. See them from a boat deck instead (below) and spend your afternoons in Sestri.
- Best season
- Late June to early September for the beach. June gave us warm water and the town before the August Italian-holiday crush.
- Points & hacking
- Genoa and Pisa are the closest airports; we came up the coast by car from Tuscany. Sestri sits right on the main train line, so you can skip the car entirely if you want.
44.2710° N, 9.3920° E
This is the one we’d send you to. Sestri Levante is where Italians go to the beach. Step out of the hotel and you’re in a hustling, cute little town: five gelato shops, great little restaurants, cheap and casual, everyone around you speaking Italian. The heart of it is the Baia del Silenzio, the Bay of Silence, a calm crescent cove rimmed with pastel buildings, warm shallow water, fishing boats pulled up on the sand. We stayed at Hotel Miramare & Spa in a sea-view suite right above it. Not cheap, a real splurge, and half the magic of the trip was walking down to that water every morning.
Our routine barely changed all week, which is the point. Mornings on the bay. A long lunch. Gelato in the old town. Then evenings on the hotel’s waterfront restaurant patio: Melissa getting ready upstairs, Jamey down early with a cigar and a drink, JJ keeping him company at the table. We ate there almost every single night, and it’s where Jamey had the best pesto of his life. Get the pesto, get the pesto lasagna, and don’t rush any of it. Two more dinners worth booking, both right on the bay: Ristorante Portobello and Ristorante Baia del Silenzio. Reserve either for sunset.
Cinque Terre felt like Disney World: beautiful, and so crowded it stops being fun. Sestri was a hundred times better. Everyone around you is Italian, and nobody’s in line.
About Cinque Terre, since you’re this close: we did the day trip, and we wouldn’t do it on foot again. The villages are beautiful and completely overrun in summer. What we would do again is the boat. We took a coastal tour with Matilde Navigazione out of Monterosso and saw the cliffside villages from the water, which is the view you actually came for. Fair warning: the boat ride runs long and gets rocky. And skip the coastal drive between the towns; it’s windy enough that people in our group were getting carsick. The girls took the train back, Jamey drove, and the train won.
Then you come back to Sestri, where it’s quiet again. That contrast is the whole case for it: the famous coast for an afternoon, the actual vacation the rest of the week. Book the sea-view room, reserve the little hotel beach, and don’t over-plan.
