We are back home since around 2 weeks, and while I sit on our terrace on a warm golden October day I’ll recap the last 11 days of our summer camper van trip.
In order to spend some time at the beach and on the bikes, we’ve chosen Punta Ala and the huge campsite Punta Ala Camp & Resort for the final days.
Travelling there from Riva del Garda was hassle-free besides the really bad conditions on the public Italian motorway.
Arriving at the campsite in the evening it first took around one hour to get the check-in done. First we learned that parts of the campsite would be getting closed due to low season, 2nd there was a German older lady that insisted to get a print out of the weather forecast for the next 2 weeks, which is rather uncommon in our digital era where even my parents (both over 70) are fully into mobile services.
Well, as mentioned it was off-season already so we found a beautiful spot for us and the van surrounded by pine trees.
The Punta Ala trail center is located at the campsite with a small shop so we first bought tubeless valves to fix my flat tyre permanently and prepare my Canyon Strive:ON for the next trail tour. As we were travelling with our E-MTBs we did not make use of the shuttle offering of the trail center.
We had 2 days with really bad weather, where it was raining cats and dogs 24 hours.
We did the following trail rides during our stay:
Trail Tour – Sasserelli – Gagliardi – 301 – Carbonai
Rest of the time was spend with reading, stand up paddling, watching Netflix and normal bike rides.
The trail network is dense and with an E-Bike a lot of fun to ride. But some trails were so eroded that I couldn’t imagine how to ride those sections without extraordinary bike skills. So even if you chose easier routes you need to be prepared to get off your bike from time to time.
Overall and in comparison – I really enjoyed Finale Ligure more, closer to vivid town life, nicer views, more Italian ice cream. So yes, it is a nice MTB trail center but I assume it was sufficient for us to visit it once.
The campsite
The campsite is a typical Italian one, family friendly and close by a long sand beach. Lavatories were never really clean, something you simply have to accept. The campsite overall has been clean and they even started recycling (well done!). Spots are available with fresh water and waste water connection, there are also bungalows to rent. The shop had everything you need for acceptable prices. Next supermarket is around 15 min by car.
The pizza at the restaurant was ok, but the coffee at the bar was excellent :-).
| Recovery factor | ☺☺☺☺ |
| Parking space size | ☺☺☺☺☺ |
| Lavatory / Washrooms | ☺☺ |
| Price vs Service | ☺☺☺☺ |
| Activity factor | ☺☺☺ |
| Shopping / Restaurants | ☺☺ |
| 4G | ☺☺☺☺☺ |
| WLAN | ☺☺☺☺ |
jelisu 