Sestri Levante - Part 1
May 13th 2008 05:39
On a brisk January evening in a hushed cobble-stoned street of Sestri Levante’s old town, I sat at a table warmed by a brazier as the colours of Italy were spread before me: the rich red glass of Rossese, the milky white mozzarella, and the green pesto spread on slightly warmed foccacia. Rolling up my sleaves to immerse myself elbow deep in food and wine, I reflected on how close I’d come to bypassing this seaside village in favour of a more well known coastal town or inland city. Had I not persevered I could well have been spending my third night tucking into pasta as it dawned on me once more that what I thought was a sweet little authentic restaurant was in fact, yet again, a well concealed overpriced tourist trap.
As it was, all I had to concern myself was whether to start with the Rossese or the mysterious local aperitivo leaking pungent basil and lemon aromas that had been conjured by the bar man built like a rugby prop and blessed with the nimble hands of pianist.
But I wondered, as I worked my way through the caffe’s short but excellent local wine list, how many others beating the well worn path between Portofino and the Cinqueterre on Italy’s Ligurian Riviera had made the mistake of dismissing Sestri Levante upon the sight of its drab new town, passing up the isthmus’ fresh local pesto for a city’s mass produced pasta?
Of all the literary luminaries associated with the Gulf of Poets that laps the coast of the Ligurian Riviera, it is Andersen’s works that resonate in the village of Sestri Levante still; Andersen who had Baia delle Favole named in his honour. Whether in the minds of the naming committee of the time or not, while Hemingway, Goethe, and Lord Byron all spent the briefest snippets of time in the fishing village, Byron penning a relaxing complimentary verse about the breeze, it is Andersen’s stories most pertinent to the modern day settlement.
Sestri is the author’s most famous fable in reverse. While Andersen told of an ugly duckling blossoming into a beautiful swan, Sestri has devolved through the years from a cosy clutch of cloistered streets on the isthmus and imposing palaces and fortresses on the peninsula, to a town fanning out onto the mainland with uninspired grey concrete shop lined streets. The cute duckling of a fishing village has become an ugly swan of a twenty first century town.
Although Sestri Levante would remain relatively overlooked even without the tourist prophylactic new town, wedged as it is between two famous neighbours. North, Portofino claims pedigree as one of Europe’s richest towns, and south, the five dramatic villages of the Cinqueterre cling to the steep terrain, lauded justifiably as one of the most attractive coasts in all of southern Europe. And Sestri’s in the middle, a meow to the lion’s roar.
So if you didn’t know of the downy charm beyond the concrete and chewing gum dotted footpaths, it’s unlikely you’d make it to the isthmus huddled around Portobello. It’s almost unavoidable to approach Sestri from the new town. Post-war built streets of kebab shops, real estate agents, hardware stores and eyesore brick blocks of flats greeted me as I alighted from the station. I walked tentatively down Via Roma towards the Baia delle Favole in the unnerving emptiness of a town battened down inside following a bitter winter squall. At the water’s edge the littered beach and soggy nostalgic promenade of Vittoria Veneto brought me within a pizza crust width of turning around and heading up the coast to Portofino. Had I not been intrigued by the ruins of the peninsula I would’ve never made it to Piazza Matteoti and the hidden old town at the edge of Portobello. And not many tourists do it seems. At least in the off season.
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