Anzio and Nettuno are twin towns on the Lazio coast, about fifty kilometres south of Rome, sharing a beach, a harbour and a great deal of history. The Roman emperor Nero was born in Antium, as Anzio was known, and the ruins of the imperial villa survive on the cliff above the sea, with a grotto and a sweep of brickwork. In the twentieth century the place was in the news in a different way. In January 1944, Allied forces landed here in Operation Shingle, hoping to outflank the German lines at Cassino and race to Rome, and instead found themselves pinned to the beachhead for months in hard fighting.
The aftermath is still visible. At Nettuno, a few kilometres east, the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery holds the graves of more than seven thousand American soldiers in rows of white marble crosses and stars, in a calm, formal landscape of lawns and pines, with a chapel and a wall inscribed with the names of the missing. It is a sobering place, quiet and beautifully kept, and worth a stop. Anzio's war museum records the landing from several viewpoints, including those of the local civilians.
Today the towns are a seaside resort for Romans, with long sandy beaches, a busy harbour where ferries leave for the islands of Ponza and Ventotene, and restaurants lining the front that serve spaghetti with clams and fried fish. It is lively in summer and almost deserted in winter, when the sea turns grey and storms pound the breakwater. A walk on the pier at sunset is the best way to end a day.
For riders, the roads to the coast, the Via Nettunense and the Via Pontina, are flat and busy, with lots of lorries and holiday traffic, and are best avoided on summer weekends. A better route runs inland through the hills toward Lanuvio and the Castelli Romani, with bends, shade and views. The surface is fairly good, but patches of loose gravel appear after storms. Both towns have fuel stations and shops, with more than forty-five thousand people in Anzio alone, and parking is easy outside high season. In summer, arrive early to find a place near the beach.