Lignano, like any really popular tourist destination, is in many ways just awful. Located in very northern Italy, Lignano has Austria's closest beach. As a result, the place both feeds on and is totally ruined by hordes and hordes of pink, German-speaking mountain people seeking a plunge in the sea.
It is filled with gaggles of drunk teenagers on spring-break type trips. The beach is packed with endless rows and depressingly deep columns of umbrellas and deckchairs, all of which are strewn with low-maintenance holiday-makers and their noisy offspring (like us). Long-suffering immigrants march the beach doing the hard sell on shitty trinkets. Miles and miles and miles of beachfront property are filled with medium-sized hotels that range from soulless to cheesy.
But the good outweighs the bad: you can always find a room and an umbrella, there are arcades and amusement parks (never been myself, but Gulliverlandia sounds intriguing), they sell ice cream and sunscreen every ten feet, and you have to walk about 100 meters from the tideline into the placid sea before the water gets up to your waist. It's like going to the pool, only safer. The beach is soft and sandy and devoid of all life besides the very occasional mollusk, bait-size fish or crab. And despite the fact that it's 90% Austrians roaming about, you are actually in Italy, and so the fruit and veg, restaurants and coffee are all great.
I've been there with friends several times over the last ten years or so, and have usually stayed in the same hotel, where you have bring your own sheets and towels and toilet paper and pay extra if you're not going to personally scrub the room clean afterwards (which I'm not, thanks). The mattresses and pillows are salty and lumpy. But every room has a kitchen and a balcony with a table and plenty of chairs, and it's directly on the shore, and in general feels like a home. I kind of love it.
On this trip I asked Clemens, who is responsible for making arrangements (because he speaks Italian and his family have been staying in this hotel since time immemorial) what the rooms would cost if we used booking.com. He looked at me like I was insane.
"Have you seen Frau Kohlrabi's book?," he asked. (Everyone calls her Mrs Turnip. Apparently her actual name sounds a bit like "Kohlrabi," and she looks like one, too.) He explained that paying up involves a ten-minute wait while the Turnip licks her fingers and flips back and forth through the pages, making notes and erasing numbers with a stubby pencil. "I have no idea what she's doing in there," said Clemens. "Maybe she's just acting important."
We spent the evenings with our friends, drinking vino on a balcony next to the baby monitor. Ten years ago we'd be up all night at one of the truly terrible discos and would sleep it off on the beach. Now we pushed the sleeping baby down past the bars at nine p.m., shaking our heads at the sight of shirtless boys and glittery girls drinking vodka out of hollow watermelons. They were hopping around to commercial techno, showing off their boring tattoos and their very nice bodies, getting it on with randoms, and ultimately vomiting on everything nice. It's actually quite heart-warming. There is nothing more feral and human than a bunch of drunk youths.
In the early morning Alex, the Noodle and I would go stroll around the mostly-empty main strip. A smashed watermelon, lost hair decorations, broken glass. In some cases you could almost picture exactly what had happened where.
For instance, I tried to withdraw some money from an ATM and realized only after several minutes of pushing diverse buttons (I speak zero Italian) that it was empty and wasn't going to work. Then I noticed that the wall and floor all around the cash machine were covered in big, wet stains. Elementary, my dear Watson, I deduced. The machine must have stopped working some time last night. And then I thought, I should probably wash my hands.
What has not changed over the years is my deep affection for building sand castles. If Alex and I have one thing in common, it's the fact that we can both really get into crafting something tedious. This year we had the added benefit of the Noodle, who was our personal Godzilla. Her presence also seemed to justify buying all the fancy plastic tools we wanted. Well, her and the fact that we no longer calculate the opportunity cost of beach toys in terms of vodka-filled melons.
This year, with six of us working to pile sand, hold passers-by at bay and keep each other well-moistened with light white wine spritzers, we managed to do quite the project--a larger-than-life sand mermaid lying around on the beach. Lots of little kids and their parents came by to take pictures and help donate seaweed, shells and blobs of sand. (You know you're in Europe when no one gives a hoot that you've built sand hooters.)
Noodle, for her part, had a blast at the beach. She was either laughing hysterically at the waves, the sand, the muck and the algae, or she was fast asleep. Needless to say, this was also awesome for her parents.
First baby beach trip was a great success. Can we go back yet?
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| Sand mouse. |
It is filled with gaggles of drunk teenagers on spring-break type trips. The beach is packed with endless rows and depressingly deep columns of umbrellas and deckchairs, all of which are strewn with low-maintenance holiday-makers and their noisy offspring (like us). Long-suffering immigrants march the beach doing the hard sell on shitty trinkets. Miles and miles and miles of beachfront property are filled with medium-sized hotels that range from soulless to cheesy.
 |
| From the neck up, baby. |
But the good outweighs the bad: you can always find a room and an umbrella, there are arcades and amusement parks (never been myself, but Gulliverlandia sounds intriguing), they sell ice cream and sunscreen every ten feet, and you have to walk about 100 meters from the tideline into the placid sea before the water gets up to your waist. It's like going to the pool, only safer. The beach is soft and sandy and devoid of all life besides the very occasional mollusk, bait-size fish or crab. And despite the fact that it's 90% Austrians roaming about, you are actually in Italy, and so the fruit and veg, restaurants and coffee are all great.
I've been there with friends several times over the last ten years or so, and have usually stayed in the same hotel, where you have bring your own sheets and towels and toilet paper and pay extra if you're not going to personally scrub the room clean afterwards (which I'm not, thanks). The mattresses and pillows are salty and lumpy. But every room has a kitchen and a balcony with a table and plenty of chairs, and it's directly on the shore, and in general feels like a home. I kind of love it.
 |
| Destruction. |
On this trip I asked Clemens, who is responsible for making arrangements (because he speaks Italian and his family have been staying in this hotel since time immemorial) what the rooms would cost if we used booking.com. He looked at me like I was insane.
"Have you seen Frau Kohlrabi's book?," he asked. (Everyone calls her Mrs Turnip. Apparently her actual name sounds a bit like "Kohlrabi," and she looks like one, too.) He explained that paying up involves a ten-minute wait while the Turnip licks her fingers and flips back and forth through the pages, making notes and erasing numbers with a stubby pencil. "I have no idea what she's doing in there," said Clemens. "Maybe she's just acting important."
 |
| Bubbles helping to dismantle a castle. |
In the early morning Alex, the Noodle and I would go stroll around the mostly-empty main strip. A smashed watermelon, lost hair decorations, broken glass. In some cases you could almost picture exactly what had happened where.
 |
| I should never have let her taste ice cream. She's a machine. |
For instance, I tried to withdraw some money from an ATM and realized only after several minutes of pushing diverse buttons (I speak zero Italian) that it was empty and wasn't going to work. Then I noticed that the wall and floor all around the cash machine were covered in big, wet stains. Elementary, my dear Watson, I deduced. The machine must have stopped working some time last night. And then I thought, I should probably wash my hands.
What has not changed over the years is my deep affection for building sand castles. If Alex and I have one thing in common, it's the fact that we can both really get into crafting something tedious. This year we had the added benefit of the Noodle, who was our personal Godzilla. Her presence also seemed to justify buying all the fancy plastic tools we wanted. Well, her and the fact that we no longer calculate the opportunity cost of beach toys in terms of vodka-filled melons. This year, with six of us working to pile sand, hold passers-by at bay and keep each other well-moistened with light white wine spritzers, we managed to do quite the project--a larger-than-life sand mermaid lying around on the beach. Lots of little kids and their parents came by to take pictures and help donate seaweed, shells and blobs of sand. (You know you're in Europe when no one gives a hoot that you've built sand hooters.)
Noodle, for her part, had a blast at the beach. She was either laughing hysterically at the waves, the sand, the muck and the algae, or she was fast asleep. Needless to say, this was also awesome for her parents.
First baby beach trip was a great success. Can we go back yet?
 |
| Family selfie! |
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| The youthful hordes I was talking about? They liked the mermaid too. |
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| Look on our works, ye mighty, and despair! |
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