43.571° N, 13.572° E
Complete guide
Spiaggia di Mezzavalle: beach guide
What the beach is like
Mezzavalle beach lies in the comune of Ancona, on the Riviera del Conero, entirely surrounded by the nature of the Parco del Conero. It is the last beach of Ancona and the first of the beaches of the Parco naturale della Riviera del Conero, 20 kilometres of coastline on the Adriatic. It is about 1.5 km long and at one end finishes at the Scoglio del Trave. Behind it rises Monte Conero.
Sources disagree on whether the beach can be used. The pages of the italia.it portal, which carry no date, describe it as the free beach par excellence of the Riviera del Conero, reachable on foot. The excerpt of the ordinances in force published by the Parco del Conero, which cites the 2026 bathing safety ordinance, instead places the whole beach within stretches of coast where access and mooring are banned. The details are in the section on rules.
Sources do not agree on what the beach is made of either. One italia.it page speaks of a rather sandy shore where stones are not lacking, while another page on the same portal describes it as fine shingle. A survey dated 29 June 2023 for the Parco del Conero reports material ranging from pebbles to fine sand and a beach about 20-30 metres wide. According to the same survey, in the part furthest from the sea there is a thin strip of psammophilous vegetation.
Getting there
The available access directions come from the italia.it pages, which are undated, and do not take into account the bans reported in the Park's excerpt of the ordinances. According to italia.it, the beach can be reached by sea or on foot, along two footpaths that are not long but fairly steep in places. The portal says the paths run down the side of a gully: one is longer and more winding, the other shorter and steeper.
The main path starts from the Conero provincial road just before the Portonovo roundabout, if you are coming from Ancona. From a small clearing a track of about 500 metres begins. The other access is the Trave path: coming from Ancona, about 4 km after the Pietralacroce district, you will see a kind of gate on the left and can park on the right, where there is a dashed white line. Beyond the gate, keeping left, you reach a small field, where the descent begins, with views of the beach all the way down. Ancona is 6.8 km as the crow flies to the north-west.
Before setting off, it is advisable to check the ordinances in force and to respect the signs on site.
When to go
Judging by the orientation of the coast, the beach faces north-east. With the tramontana (north wind), the grecale (north-east wind) and the levante (east wind) the wind blows from the sea and the beach is exposed to waves. With the ostro (south wind), the libeccio (south-west wind) and the ponente (west wind) the wind blows from the land and the sea close to shore stays calmer. The sirocco (scirocco) and the mistral (maestrale) hit it side-on. This is an indication based on orientation, not a forecast.
The Park survey notes that the beach is exposed to storms and heavy seas, though to a lesser extent than San Michele and Sassi Neri. For 30 August 2026, from 6:00 to 10:30, the Comune di Ancona announced «CleanAlba a Mezza», a dawn clean-up of the beach, together with an association, the Capitaneria di porto (coast guard), the Università Politecnica delle Marche and Anconambiente. The initiative planned to use canoes and SUP boards to reach otherwise inaccessible stretches of coast, focusing on beaches that are hard to reach on foot or by waste-collection vehicles.
Seabed and sea
The italia.it portal highlights the blue of the sea. In the 2025 season the European Environment Agency rated the bathing water quality as excellent. In QualeSpiaggia data, taken from OpenStreetMap, the material of the beach is recorded as sand, while the other sources also mention fine shingle and pebbles. The sources consulted do not describe the seabed. According to the Park's excerpt of the ordinances, bathing is banned in the first 100 metres of sea in front of the beach.
Facilities and free beach
The italia.it pages present it as a free beach without beach establishments. The Park's 2023 survey also reports that there are no beach establishments on the sand. Italia.it describes it as the right place for those who love beaches in their natural state. These descriptions do not mention the access and bathing bans reported in the excerpt of the ordinances in force.
Rules and protected areas
The Parco del Conero publishes an excerpt of the ordinances in force on the Conero coast covering bathing, berthing, mooring and navigation, which also cites the 2026 bathing safety ordinance. According to this excerpt, Ancona municipal ordinance no. 41/2019 of 17/05/2019 bans access and mooring, for any reason, along a series of stretches of coast at the foot of Monte Conero, each identified as an area with a letter. Of these stretches, area D runs from the coast below the municipal Passetto swimming pool to a point on Mezzavalle beach, 360 metres to the south-west of where the path called Mezzavalle «sud» (south) reaches the coast. From that same point, area E continues to Portonovo beach. The two areas, one after the other, therefore cover the whole of Mezzavalle beach.
The same excerpt states that in these areas, at risk of hydrogeological instability, the Ancona coast guard (Guardia costiera) ordinances no. 36 of 25/05/2023 and no. 27 of 09/05/2026 ban bathing and any nautical activity within the first 100 metres of sea from the shore. The first approves the regulation of recreational boating in the Ancona maritime district, the second is the 2026 bathing safety ordinance. On the excerpt's map these stretches carry a notice banning access, navigation and bathing within the first 100 metres of sea. According to the ordinances, the bans apply for the whole duration of the closure measures.
This picture contrasts with the undated italia.it pages, which describe Mezzavalle as a free beach reachable on foot and indicate where to park. Before going, it is advisable to check the ordinances in force with the competent authorities and to respect the signs on site.
Nearby
According to italia.it, from the Trave path you can walk towards the historic Trave beach, where there was once a concrete structure on the sea. Further south the beach borders Portonovo, which the Comune di Ancona describes as the busiest and best-loved bay of the Conero. The beaches of Portonovo, mostly shingle and stones, alternate free and equipped stretches, and along the coast there are restaurants with tables on the beach. In 2026 Portonovo appears on the FEE Blue Flag (Bandiera Blu) list.
The Spiaggia del Molo, 1.7 km as the crow flies to the south-east, is the closest of the beaches listed by QualeSpiaggia. Further away, 5.2 km as the crow flies to the south-east, the Due Sorelle beach below Monte Conero, according to italia.it, can only be reached by sea on boat trips from Numana and Sirolo.
Sources
- FEE Italia — Bandiera Blu 2026, elenco spiagge
- OpenStreetMap
- EEA — Bathing water quality 2025 (IT011042002015)
- QualeSpiaggia — open data spiagge (CC BY 4.0)
- Italia.it — Spiaggia Mezzavalle
- Italia.it — La Spiaggia di Mezzavalle e le sue 10 sorelle sulla Riviera del Conero
- Parco del Conero — Estratto delle ordinanze vigenti sulla costa del Conero (balneazione, attracco, ormeggio, navigazione)
- Parco del Conero — Monitoraggio di alcune specie di uccelli di interesse comunitario (2023)
- Comune di Ancona — «CleanAlba a Mezza», 30 agosto 2026
- Comune di Ancona — Baia di Portonovo