We’d always planned to drive around the coast after our June wedding at Podere Ciona in Chianti, but I would never have stumbled across Camaiore if not for visiting a friend, the painter Emma Hepburn Ferrer. Following a week at Agriturismo La Forra in Montegonzi, my husband Daniel, 3-year-old daughter Sloane and I said goodbye to our friends, family, and villa and drove three hours northwest to accompany my nieces to the Cinque Terre.
After a night in Manarola and a local train ride to Monterosso for a day on the sand, we looped back an hour south by car to stay with Emma and her boyfriend Thomas, a sculptor whose family has lived here for many generations, at their house in the Camaiore hills. Emma spent her childhood between Italy, Switzerland and Los Angeles, vacationing at the very same house with her father (the eldest son of Audrey Hepburn, her grandmother), and it’s been her home base since the pandemic. I would have happily traveled much farther than we ended up needing to, just to have her tour us around this private pocket of Tuscany.
About 20–30 minutes from ultra-posh Forte dei Marmi, the resort town favored by fabulous Milanese, Camaiore is sleepier and family-friendly, but its beach culture has been alive and well since the 19th century. And—this being the “Tuscan Riviera” since the tourist boom of the 1960s—it’s all about the sea. Once the site of one of the largest military bases of the Roman Empire, Camaiore is essentially two distinct parts: the medieval village nestled slightly inland at the foot of the Apuan Alps, and Lido di Camaiore on the Ligurian Sea.
It’s an authentic summer haven for Italian families, many of whom return year after year to the same rental. A year-round population of around 30,000 swells to 100,000–150,000 in the summer, many of them nationals. You won’t find too many Americans (that’s what the Cinque Terre is for), but you will probably see plenty of Northern Europeans and their camper vans, drawn by the mix of sea and mountain hiking. But first, the beach.
Lido di Camaiore Beach Clubs
Lungomare Europa is the seaside walking/biking promenade—4 km of fine golden sand and rows of colorful umbrellas and chairs distinguishing one beach club from the next, lining Viale Bernardini. This stretch is part of the larger Versilia coastline, which runs from Viareggio up through Forte dei Marmi, before the coast bends into Massa-Carrara and then Liguria. Locals and regulars have beach club memberships—we met Emma at hers for an afternoon swim and aperitivo—but day passes are made for tourists and daytrippers.
The stabilimento balneari (privately managed beach resorts) give you access to sunbeds, deck chairs, umbrellas, towels and cotton bathrobes, private changing cabins and hot showers, and usually lifeguards, for around 35 euros. (I’ve heard there are discounted rates at some clubs later in the day.) It’s not the turquoise waters of, say, Puglia, but it was quite something to bob up and down in the waves with the marbly mountains rising over Lucca province in the distance.
Take your pick, but most—like Bagno Danio and Bagno Nilo—have simple adjacent restaurants, bars, and snack bars, plus bare-bones apartments or affordable, serviceable hotel rooms. Danio even has a swimming pool.
Public Beach
Most of the Versilia coastline is privatized, but there are spiagge libere (free public beaches) here, too. At Piazza Lemmetti on the southern end of the pier, and Piazza Principe Umberto to the north, you’re on your own in terms of amenities, but the promenade is where the late night beach bars live.
After the beach, we piled into Emma’s Fiat 500L, because I never would’ve trusted us to make it safely up the single-lane dirt roads to her mountainside house—past the main village, which could never be mistaken for anything but an Italian hilltown (tiny streets, Romanesque churches). We left the car at the base of the hill and walked the rest of the way through the stone houses.
The summer solstice meant the sun didn’t set until after 9 o’clock, and we stepped into her treetop painter’s studio at the peak of golden hour. Canvases leaned in every corner, with the drop-dead view of the mountains framed in the windows. Since leaving New York during the pandemic, Emma’s built a practice here shaped by its rhythms: the light, food, quiet, the rituals that come with living close to nature. Her work draws on spiritual customs and symbolism, and the setting—chestnut groves, old churches, wild animals, history everywhere—constantly feeds it.
Sloane capered with Emma’s two enormous white dogs—Orso, a polar bear/sheepdog, and Lilla, who, on my watch, let herself out of the house and immediately sought liberation in the mountainside woods below. After eventually giving up trying to call her back, Thomas’s mother took over from their neighboring home so we could finally head to dinner with Sloane at 9:30. I’m still unclear how my toddler adjusted so effortlessly to dinner hours stretching past midnight while I struggled to get by.
Town of Camaiore
There are two main squares, with the 13th-century church, Santa Maria Assunta Collegiata, as the centerpiece of the walking village. (No cars allowed in the Italian historic centers.) In Emma’s village, instead of a civil code, house numbers are determined by the number of steps it takes from the church to the home.“300 steps from the church,” or “2,000 steps from the church.” Behind a Renaissance painting in the church is a fresco that holds a tiny marble Madonna, illuminated day and night for passersby to see her shining through the window.
Nearby is the 8th-century Roman abbey, La Badia di San Pietro. A five-minute drive away, the 9th-century La Pieve di Santo Stefano di Camaiore sits above the town, where Emma’s brothers were baptized in its font carved from a 2nd-century marble sarcophagus.
Eat & Drink
Ristorante La Pieve di Camaiore – We sat outside at the base of the church as mopeds whizzed by our table on the street. Two very long menu pages featured wood-fired pizza (gluten-free options too!) and lively local families crowded the tables until late into the night.
Taverna Camaiorese – Cozy, outstanding traditional Tuscan meats and house made pasta
Mondo Goloso – Must-have ice cream!
La Dogana – A beautiful restaurant nestled in an olive grove in the hills. One of the fancier options, with excellent food and an exquisite view.
Chestnuts! A staple of the food culture, Camaiore has long depended on foraged chestnuts. Foraging—like hunting—is a huge part of the local food culture. In the fall, necci, the traditional flat, pancake-like bread made with ground chestnut flour and served with ricotta cream and honey, or castagnaccio, a chestnut bread with rosemary and pinenuts, will start showing up in pasticcerias, agriturismo farm stands, and at fairs like Festa della Castagna and Fiera di Ognissanti (All Saints Day fair) in the beginning of November. That time of year, fresh, wild porcini mushrooms will also start lining the woods.
Shop & Explore
Altri Tempi – A favorite antiques and vintage market in August, all about honoring the Camaiore of “other times.”
Lorolì – Incredible selection of vintage, many of it impeccable Italian pieces.
The Museo di Arte Sacra (Sacred Art Museum) – Home to an exquisite polychrome wood sculpture of the Madonna from the Lucchese school: Vergine Annunciata (Matteo Civitali, Lucca, 1436–1502), carved from a single trunk of wood. For true art lovers, it’s worth visiting for this piece alone.
Sculpture
Nearby Pietrasanta and Carrara are the world’s mecca for marble. Carrara is where Michelangelo himself sourced, and sculptors come from all over the world to produce in Pietrasanta’s centuries of history. Thomas works in one of the bronze foundries and studied with Fernando Botero, whose public artworks dot the region, even along the highway.
Some say Pietrasanta has more art galleries per square meter than anywhere else in Italy, and the town draws many working artists. Head here for gallery walks on summer nights.
Museo dei Bozzetti (Pietrsanta)– A showcase of over 700 sculpture models from legendary artists
Piazza del Duomo (Pietrasanta)– Rotating open-air installations
Cava Museo Fantiscritti (Carrara)–An open-air museum of stone cutters’ artifacts
Fantiscitti or Miseglia—View extraction straight from the mountain quarries
Pisa is just 30 minutes away, home to the Piazza dei Miracoli and the Camposanto Monumentale with its restored medieval frescoes—including Buffalmacco’s Triumph of Death.
Hike/Mountain Bike
The Apuan Alps are a major mountain destination.
Monte Prana — Summit the iconic local peak for its stunning views.
Pania della Croce — The highest peak in the Apuan Alps, for experienced hikers.
Monte Matanna and Foce di Vinca— Scenic, gentle trails through forests and meadows.
Monte Gabberi — Moderate hikes with panoramic views.
Foce di Mosceta — Historic routes that blend nature and old stone villages.
Apuan Alps Regional Park — A network of trails with diverse terrain, from limestone cliffs to wildflower meadows.
Hotels/Stays
Next summer, Emma’s summer rental will be open for the public in her village but until then:
Le Gusciane – A farmhouse stay in the hills above Camaiore is the agriturismo ideal, plus four dachshunds and a bee farm).
Casale Paradiso – In Buchignano village, a peaceful hilltop mini-farm with sea views, a pool, chickens, and donkeys.
Paradis – A 12-room boutique hotel on main square, or its organic luxury agriturismo on 9-hectares two kilometers away, backed by the Carrera hills
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