Bandiera Blu
Bandiera Blu in Abruzzo
8 towns
Abruzzo holds 8 Bandiera Blu sites inside our catalogue. They cluster in the Teramo, L'Aquila, and Chieti provinces.
The three most recognised in our catalogue are Scanno, Pineto, and Roseto degli Abruzzi. 5 more towns carry the mark alongside them.
Scanno
Province: L'Aquila · 1,057 m
A 1,057-meter Sagittario valley village where women in black still walk the alleys photographed by Cartier-Bresson and Giacomelli.
Pineto
Province: Teramo · 4 m
A planned twentieth-century beach town named for D'Annunzio's poem, with the sixteenth-century Cerrano tower anchoring Abruzzo's first marine protected area.
Roseto degli Abruzzi
Province: Teramo · 8 m
An Adriatic beach town of 25,500 with ten kilometers of low-rise sand, a hilltop frazione at 285 meters, and Blue Flags since 1995.
Villalago
Province: L'Aquila · 930 m
A 930-meter village above three lakes, named for the nine that once filled the valley, with a hermit's cave on the water's edge.
Alba Adriatica
Province: Teramo · 5 m
The northernmost of the Teramo coast's seven sisters, a 1956 spin-off from Tortoreto with a fine-sand beach known as the Spiaggia d'Argento.
Silvi
Province: Teramo · 242 m
A split town on the Teramo coast, medieval Silvi Paese at 242 meters above a nine-kilometer beach that built itself on licorice in the 1930s.
Vasto
Province: Chieti · 144 m
At 144 meters on a hill above the Adriatic, Vasto is home of the brodetto vastese, invented in 1800.
Giulianova
Province: Teramo · 68 m
Coastal town split between hilltop Paese at 68 meters and the Lido below, one rebuilt as a Renaissance ideal city, the other grown around a working fishing fleet.
From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Cicala
Province: Catanzaro
A village of 887 people at 829 meters, founded in 1616 by farmers asking for land.
Fossombrone
Province: Pesaro e Urbino
An inland Marchigiano town on the Metauro river, layered over a Roman colony with a Renaissance ducal court rising above it.
Bagnoli del Trigno
Province: Isernia
The 'Pearl of Molise', a 637-resident borgo built into and around a massive limestone outcrop above the Trigno valley, with a medieval castle rebuilt on its summit.
Varenna
Province: Lecco
A fishing village founded in 769 on the Lecco arm of Lake Como, with a steep grid of streets falling into the water.
Rocca di Botte
Province: L'Aquila
At 750 meters on the Carseolani slopes between Abruzzo and Lazio, the birthplace of an eleventh-century hermit and a fief of the Colonna.