"Just a 30-minute bus ride from bustling Palermo, Mondello has a long, half-moon-shaped beachfront with stretches of white sand, colorful sun loungers and city folk cooling off in the waves. It can be shoulder-to-shoulder during the height of summer, when it seems like the entire population of the capital migrates here for ferragosto, but it’s worth visiting for the Art Nouveau waterfront villas and striking rock cliffs that sandwich the shore." - Katharine Sohn, Rosalyn Wikeley