It's always a struggle to motive everyone to get out of the villa early. I announced that I wanted to leave by 9:30am, so that we could actually leave by 10. At least that was my plan. But in reality, we left at 10:45! It was a two-hour drive to Sabaudia and the Il San Francesco hotel. As soon as we arrived, we could see that this is a beautiful property. While Sabaudia is a "beach town" it also has a large lake. Il San Francesco is situated along the banks of the lake and has a beautiful, tranquil garden filled with teak garden furniture and white cushions, and with a few errant ducks roaming around. Our rooms weren't ready, but we changed into our swimsuits in the palestra so we could go to the beach.
The beach in Sabaudia is gorgeous -- beautiful sand dunes with natural scrub; clear, tranquil and shallow water. And, lots and lots of sand. This was the first beach of this type that I'd ever seen in Italy. Fregene has dark, almost muddy sand; and others are more of the pebble variety. Even in Positano, the sandy beach is small with the rocky coastline jutting up just behind it. The only one who was dissappointed was Josh. He still couldn't swim due to his surgery; and he certainly couldn't risk getting any sand in his wound so he kept his leg wrapped.
We spent quite a long and lanquid afternoon at the beach before returning to the hotel. As soon as I entered our rooms, I knew our luck of getting great hotel rooms during our year in Italy had run out. We had been given two tiny connecting rooms with a view overlooking the alley next to the back door of the kitchen. Upon further review, the entire hotel has only three rooms in this undesirable positon and we were in two of them. We asked to move, but the hotel was full. First Josh, then I, complained to owner. She gave us a load of bull about making our reservations late with these being the only rooms available at that time (there was no shortage of availability when we made our reservation); they'd made an exception to take our reservation for this holiday weekend for one night only, all the other guests were staying three nights (nothing of the sort was ever mentioned when we'd called to book our rooms); we'd requested connecting rooms and these are the only two in the hotel (if someone had informed us that by choosing connecting rooms they would be significantly smaller, we may have requested rooms next to, or across the hall from one another); oh, and yes these rooms rent for the same price as the rooms that are larger and overlooking the garden (good if you can get it, I guess). Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah....in the end we all enjoyed a complimentary spritz or lemon soda in the garden. The kids ran around and they were happy. Also, tomorrow we would have use of these rooms all day, and would not be subject to the 11am check out policy. Judging from the appearance of the shower at the beach, this concession would actually be extremely beneficial. As natural as the beach is, the facilities too are very rustic. There are no cabanas or changing rooms.
There was some confusion at the reception desk. At first, we were told that hotel guests have free access to a private beach. Then, when the reception realized that one of the rooms had been donated to a charity event, we were informed that we would have to pay a fee for the chairs at the beach for the guests of that room. Our stay at Il Francesco was precipitated by the fact that we were the winning bidders at the silent auction during the AWAR Gala at Villa Taverna. The donated item was a one-night stay for two people. Since we wanted to bring the kids, we reserved a second room for which we were paying the hotel directly. Apart from the confusion about the beach fee, we were initially informed that the hotel will provide us with towels to take to the beach. Later, when he asked for the towels, they told Josh that there is a charge of 5 euros per towel per day. For 25 euros, we can use our own towels, thank you very much! We had thrown our own beach towels in the car, not knowing if they'd be needed or not.
The beach in Sabaudia is gorgeous -- beautiful sand dunes with natural scrub; clear, tranquil and shallow water. And, lots and lots of sand. This was the first beach of this type that I'd ever seen in Italy. Fregene has dark, almost muddy sand; and others are more of the pebble variety. Even in Positano, the sandy beach is small with the rocky coastline jutting up just behind it. The only one who was dissappointed was Josh. He still couldn't swim due to his surgery; and he certainly couldn't risk getting any sand in his wound so he kept his leg wrapped. 
We spent quite a long and lanquid afternoon at the beach before returning to the hotel. As soon as I entered our rooms, I knew our luck of getting great hotel rooms during our year in Italy had run out. We had been given two tiny connecting rooms with a view overlooking the alley next to the back door of the kitchen. Upon further review, the entire hotel has only three rooms in this undesirable positon and we were in two of them. We asked to move, but the hotel was full. First Josh, then I, complained to owner. She gave us a load of bull about making our reservations late with these being the only rooms available at that time (there was no shortage of availability when we made our reservation); they'd made an exception to take our reservation for this holiday weekend for one night only, all the other guests were staying three nights (nothing of the sort was ever mentioned when we'd called to book our rooms); we'd requested connecting rooms and these are the only two in the hotel (if someone had informed us that by choosing connecting rooms they would be significantly smaller, we may have requested rooms next to, or across the hall from one another); oh, and yes these rooms rent for the same price as the rooms that are larger and overlooking the garden (good if you can get it, I guess). Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah....in the end we all enjoyed a complimentary spritz or lemon soda in the garden. The kids ran around and they were happy. Also, tomorrow we would have use of these rooms all day, and would not be subject to the 11am check out policy. Judging from the appearance of the shower at the beach, this concession would actually be extremely beneficial. As natural as the beach is, the facilities too are very rustic. There are no cabanas or changing rooms. 
Sitting in the garden of the hotel was lovely, but we wanted a quick pizza dinner. We went just down the street to a funny local place with plastic play stuff for kids and picnic tables for seating. The food was not very good food at all - in fact it was bad. But the people-watching was very entertaining. There were locals of all kinds -- many of them just plain weird-looking.
It was 10pm before we got back and got to bed. For some reason, I can't remember feeling more tired.
It was 10pm before we got back and got to bed. For some reason, I can't remember feeling more tired.
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