Fiorenzuola di Focara

10 kilometers away from the over-crowded Riviera Romagnola there is the small village of Focara, perched on a rocky headland on the Adriatic coast in the Park of San Bartolo. The village is quiet with just a bar, a grocery store which sells everything and a restaurant, a little archway marks the entrance to the path that leads to the beach several metres below.
The name of Focara was added to a commonly spreaded Italian name Fiorenzuola,  which means flourishing, due to the tradition of lighting fires to signal to mariners.

the bell tower

It is a Roman settlement that has always had a strategic role due to its location, built between the X and XII centuries along with the castles of Casteldimezzo, Gradara and Granarola, was part of the defensive system in the border area between the Church of Ravenna and that of Pesaro and then, among the Malatesta possessions of Rimini and of Pesaro. In the XII century was built the church of St. Andrew, of which remains only the bell tower, in the church were present works of fine workmanship, but a violent earthquake in August 1916 destroyed it.
In the charming village there are architectural relics of the past, interesting the main door of the village is where there are the verses of Dante's Divina Comedia (Inferno, canto XXVIII) describing a dark betrayal that happened off in this sea.

passage to the beach, no signal directs you just a blue sea

Visit the lovely village of Fiorenzuola di Focara all over the year, in the summer if you fancy a swim in the unusually clear water of the Adriatic sea, walk down to the beach 500 metres away or take the shuttle (only in the morning), it's a steep road but worth doing it. The best period I would suggest for you to visit this village is in one of those clear and crispy early spring days, when the sky is pure blue and the wind still has the coolness of the snow on the mountains.

a door knob

the beach in the winter

timetable of the bus to the beach