An Italian escape for one family
Eurocamp invited SIMON LEEK and his family to spend a week sampling the delights of Italy’s Adriatic coastline at Pra Delle Torri
ICAME, I saw, I conked out. The phrase might not have quite the same grandeur as Caesar’s famous declaration after victory at Zela, but in my defence, he had an entire army, whereas the Leek family’s modern-day Italian invasion numbered precisely four.
Still, I can’t think of many better spots to relax than Pra Delle Torri (hereafter PDT), a sprawling mini-village masquerading as a campsite on Italy’s Adriatic coastline, about 40km east of the edge of the Venetian lagoon.
Our seven-day stay had begun with a two-hour flight from London Stansted to Trieste one Saturday evening in late May.
The flight itself was fine, but we did have a slight hiccup tracking down the hire car. No need to go into too much detail; suffice to say we almost got unintentionally spirited across the border into Slovenia by a well-meaning taxi-driver. As kidnaps go, it was a friendly, short-lived and entirely innocent affair.
Still, once we’d finally found the Enterprise rep, and better still our actual hire car, we loaded up and programmed the sat nav.
After a leisurely 90-minute drive (no need to hit the autostrada and cough up for tolls; the Italian secondary routes are perfectly decent) we rolled up to PDT’s barrier-guarded reception at around midnight local time.
I had been concerned our late arrival might cause problems, but the night-staff were clearly well-used to travellers arriving at all hours, and any lingering fears of a first night passed fitfully dozing in the hire car were swiftly allayed.
We left our little Audi in the car park on the edge of the residential area of the site until morning, and armed with a marked-up sitemap, navigated our way to our holiday home by mobile phone torchlight, wheeling our luggage behind us.
As far as the boys were concerned, this was already great fun, late-night exploring holding a special status in the minds of eight and 11-year-olds.
After a splendid night’s sleep, the following morning was spent checking out our holiday home, and exploring PDT’s extensive parc facilities. The Avant-class accommodation which fast became our little home-fromhome was first-rate. New, and sparkling clean, it consisted of two bedrooms, a bathroom and a nice living area, equipped with gas hob, microwave and dishwasher. It featured plenty of nice touches to help us relax in comfort; particularly appreciated were the coffee machine, Bluetooth sound system and crucially, an effective air conditioning unit. Breakfasts and evening meals were enjoyed on the sundeck in warm sunshine, but with clear skies and temperatures hitting 30°C every day, we were also sometimes grateful of cool shelter away from the blazing midday sun.
The Leek family are starting to think of themselves as seasoned Eurocampers; we’ve previously enjoyed holidays in parcs in both northern France, and southern Spain.
Nonetheless, we were taken aback by the sheer scale of PDT. As well as an on-site hotel, there are roughly 1,500 pitches on site, comprising a mixture of bungalows, cabin accommodation such as ours, and allotted spaces for motorhomes, caravans, and tents.
But does size matter? The wonderful thing about these parcs is just how well-designed and fit for purpose they are.
You like colossal swimming pools? Check. PDT had no fewer than four of them, the largest of which, despite never being more than a metre deep, took a full ten minutes to wade/ wallow/swim across from tip to spiralling tip.
The kids loved the climb-aboard pirate ship-themed splashpark, replete with the biggest tipping bucket I’ve ever seen, while the grown-ups loved the chance to do some ‘proper swimming’ in the Olympic pool, too, if only to salve consciences troubled by the twin temptations of pizza and Prosecco.
You’d prefer the beach? Fine. Our accommodation was a mere two-minute stroll to a lovely stretch of sand.
Need a bite to eat? No problem. On-site restaurants abounded – three on-site, plus a pizzeria and a takeaway as well.
Prefer to self-cater? Easy. There’s an on-parc supermarket open from 7.30am. This was great actually, not least the self-service taps for water refills, freshly-squeezed orange juice and even, somewhat dangerously, white and red wine. In the parc there are more activities laid on than you could shake a treeful of sticks at – everything from scuba and aqua-aerobics, through watersports and crazy golf, to yoga and shiatsu massage. Alongside the skatepark and parkour area (yes, really) we even found a weatherproof DJ mixing desk with induction pads. I happened to have my phone on me that evening, so the family