Torvaianica is a seaside town on the long, straight coast south of Rome, where the Tyrrhenian Sea meets a strip of dunes, umbrella pines and beach clubs, and it is the closest real beach to much of the southern half of the city. Around seventeen thousand people live here, many more in summer, in a sprawl of holiday flats, villas and pizzerias along the coast road.
The photo is the sea. Stand on the dunes at the end of a hot day and the sun drops straight into the water, turning the sky orange and the sand pink, while the silhouettes of pines line the horizon to the north. On a clear winter day the Circeo headland, the mountain of the sorceress Circe in the Odyssey, rises from the sea far down the coast to the south-east, looking for all the world like an island. The light is softer in spring and autumn, and the beaches are empty.
The coast road, the Litoranea, runs north from here through the pine forest of Castel Porziano, a vast estate that belongs to the President of the Republic and is off limits, so the road is lined for kilometres with tall trees and nothing else. It is flat and fast, with long straights, but it is also popular with cyclists and has a strict speed limit, and on summer weekends it is clogged with cars heading to the beach. South of town, the coast road continues towards Anzio and Nettuno, where the Allies landed in January 1944, and where there are large war cemeteries.
Just inland, at Pratica di Mare, lie the remains of ancient Lavinium, the town that legend says was founded by Aeneas after his flight from Troy. Archaeologists found a row of thirteen archaic altars there, and a tomb that the Romans believed was the hero's own. The town also has a darker modern story: in 1953 the body of a young woman, Wilma Montesi, was found on the beach here, and the investigation that followed became one of the great political scandals of postwar Italy.
There are plenty of bars, restaurants and fuel stations in town, and fried fish and spaghetti with clams are the obvious choice for lunch. Pomezia, a few kilometres inland, has everything else. Come out of season, or early in the morning, and you will have the beach and the light almost to yourself.