The Marche are a charming
region right in
Italy´s heartland. Here you still find what many tourists miss nowadays in
Tuscany or Umbria. Scenic but quiet towns, beaches that are not crowded
with foreigners (e.g. Senigallia),
tasty, original cuisine at a fair price and typical Italian hospitality. But
the Marche, the smallest of all Italian regions, has a lot more to offer:
Urbino is one of the finest Renaissance towns in Italy,
Macerata hosts a great open-air opera festival every summer and many
charming little towns like
Corinaldo and
Sassoferrato with their unspoilt centri storici are certainly worth a
closer look.
At the same time, there are some things you will not
find here: mass-tourism, a high crime rate and rocketing
property prices.
You may reach the Marche region via the Adriatic motorway or via the
airport of Ancona, its capital. But also Bologna, Venice or Rome are not
too far away, either. Several low-cost air carriers like
Ryan Air offer good deals to Pesaro
and Ancona.