Bordighera

Bordighera is an attractive seaside resort with panoramas from Genoa (on a clear day) to Monte Carlo. A large English colony, attracted by the mild climate, settled here in the second half of the 19th century and is still very much in evidence today; you regularly find people taking afternoon tea in the cafés, and streets are named after Queen Victoria and Shakespeare. This was the first town in Europe to grow date palms, and they still have exclusive rights to provide the Vatican with palm fronds for Easter. Thanks partly to its many year-round English residents, Bordighera doesn’t close down entirely in the off-season like some Riviera resorts, but rather serves as a quiet winter haven for all ages.