Sanremo is a resort town located in the Italian province of Imperia, Liguria region. Of course, people come here for the sake of beach holidays, entertainment, and there are sights too, but the main thing is why San Remo has become famous all over the world - the eponymous song festival, in which beginner performers and world-class stars participate.
Story
The city of San Remo on the map of Italy has been marked for several hundred years, but it received the title of a popular resort only in the 19th century. Empress Maria Fedorovna, mother of the last Russian emperor Nicholas II, loved to come here. At her command, the Russian community was founded in the city, and palm trees specially brought from Egypt were planted along the city's embankment. Later, the wife of Nicholas II, Alexandra Fedorovna, began to relax here often. Soon, San Remo became the main resting place of the Russian elite: famous artists, politicians, and members of the imperial family came here.
Among foreigners, especially the British, the city of San Remo gained special popularity thanks to the Italian novel Giovanni Ruffino "Dr. Antonio". The atmosphere of San Remo, created in the novel, turned out to be so attractive that literally over the next two seasons a stream of foreign guests poured into the city. San Remo has gained fame as a fashionable resort, and it has not subsided to this day.
Beach vacation
You can relax in San Remo all year round, but the beach season lasts from about the end of May to September, although there are people who want to swim in March and April. The peak of the season is the hottest months, July and August: during these months the air warms up to 27-28 degrees, water - up to 23, and it is very pleasant to refresh in the sea waves.
The beaches in San Remo are mostly sandy and pebble, comfortable and cozy. Most of them belong to hotels located on the seashore. Luxury hotels, real palaces are adjacent to the coast with relatively modest 2-3 star hotels, so everyone can choose a budget according to their budget.
And if some of the tourists do not like a beach holiday in San Remo, then from here you can easily reach the luxurious beaches of Nice. Direct buses and trains run regularly between these cities to Nice Ville Station. The journey takes 1-1.5 hours, a train ticket costs 15 euros.
Sights
Quarter La Pigna
The main attraction that the city of San Remo boasts is the old quarter of La Pigna, located north of the main street of Corso Matteotti. It consists of many winding narrow streets, descents, covered walkways that have retained a completely medieval look. It is very easy to get lost here, but this does not stop connoisseurs of antiquity. The friendly and sociable residents of La Pigna are always ready to tell the way to a confused tourist and even advise how to get to one or another attraction of the city - for example, a sanctuary called Madonna della Costa, which was built in the XVII century.
And from there it is best to go out onto Palace Street (via Palazzo) and see the sights located on it. Chief among them is the old San Siro Cathedral, built in the 13th century.
Villa Alfred Nobel
It is definitely worth seeing the villa of an entrepreneur, a major scientist and the founder of the most prestigious award - Alfred Nobel. He often visited San Remo, and died here in 1896. His villa - a luxurious mansion on Corso Felice Cavallotti, 112 - he called nothing more than "my nest."
Casino San Remo
Describing the most interesting sights of San Remo, you can not ignore the casino: affects the proximity to the legendary Monte Carlo. Located casino San Remo (Casinò di Sanremo) on the street Corso degli Inglesi (Corso degli Inglesi), in a luxurious building of the Art Nouveau style.
The casino has not stopped working for more than a century, since 1905, but its main visitors are not residents, but tourists. There was a time when the residents of San Remo were even officially forbidden to play in a casino; Now the ban has been lifted, but they still don’t really want to go there.
Cathedral of Christ the Savior
Finally, it is worth mentioning another attraction that has a purely Russian origin - the traditional Russian Orthodox church in honor of Christ the Savior, or the Russian Church (Chiesa Russa). The temple was built in 1913 by the Italian architect Petro Agosti according to the project of Alexei Shchusev (who subsequently designed and built the Lenin Mausoleum in Moscow). Inside the temple is an exhibition dedicated to Orthodox Russian icons.
Italian Song Festival San Remo
Every year in San Remo hosts the famous festival of Italian pop songs. Initially, the time of its holding was the end of January, but in recent years this period has been postponed to the end of February - beginning of March. These days, not only performers, but also tourists from all over the world come to the city in huge numbers.
The competition is attended by songs written by Italian composers and previously never heard. All performances are divided into two nominations: "New Voices" - for beginner singers, and a nomination for already famous and popular performers. It was the festival in San Remo that marked the beginning of the career of such Italian pop stars as Andrea Boccelli, Eros Ramazzotti, Paola & Chiara and many others.
The first music festival in San Remo was held in 1951, and only three performers took part in it - one duet and two solo singers. The competition was held in the building of the San Remo casino and was broadcast live on Rai Radio 1. Since 1955, the festival has been broadcast on television, and since 1977 the stage of performances has been transferred to the theater called Teatro Ariston. The winners were determined by the jury by open voting.
Since 2004, the winners of the festival began to be determined not only by jury voting, but also by means of SMS voting, as at Eurovision. Since 2009, Internet voting has been added to the ways to vote for a performer who’s liked.
In addition to prizes in two main categories, the San Remo festival presents several other awards: the Premio della critica, awarded by the press, the Premio Volare Prize for the best song lyrics and the award for the most significant contribution to Italian entertainment industry.
