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Santa Marinello.....DON'T GO!!!!!

by Mariann
(USA)

Stay away from Santa Marinello..... it may be a quick train ride from Rome, and the private (fee) beaches are great looking BUT the men who run them will not rent to tourists......they will tell you ( even if their beach is empty ) that they have regulars and they have no vacancy.

The public beach is disgusting. .....trash, broken glass, no sand.....it is all rock. The water off all the beaches is filthy. There is slimy stuff under the water.

We were living in Rome summer 2019 and it was hot as blazes. I did research and we really just wanted to take a day trip to a beach. We had done that kind of trip in 2015 in Sicily and Greece and Malta, and it was fabulous (Isola Bella in Sicily is heavenly).

My research led us to Santa Marinello....the express train was fine, the town is cute, but all we wanted was a beach and cool water and we had totally wasted our time and money.

We struck out at EVERY private beach. We went to the public beach long enough to look around and decide it wasn't for us. We walked back to the train station and waited almost 2 hours for the next train, and that was preferable to anything else we could do.

We weren't alone, either, at the train station: there were about 8-10 others from all over who had read the same glowing stories about Santa Marinello that I had read too. We were all very disappointed.

If you are in Rome and you just want to swim for a couple of hours, check out the pool at the Westin Hotel. I think that for $90 US, a family can stay poolside there.

Maria's reply: I agree with you entirely about Santa Marinello - and even the private beaches aren't any good. The sand may be clean, but the water is as dirty as in the free section.

In fact, as my article states, there are very few lovely beaches near Rome. That's why, if you really want decent beaches, it is worth going beyond Rome and heading north to the Maremma coastline in Tuscany. If you'd rather not go that far then try Sperlonga, it is only an hour by train from Rome and really rather nice.