San Marino

My San Marino travel summary:

Visited: June 2013

Duration of visit: 1 day

Capital city: San Marino

Population: 33.000 (2013)

San Marino travel blog reading time: 3 minutes

• The world’s oldest sovereign state, from the fourth century.
• The Guaita fortress on top of Monte Titano, at 750 meters above sea level, offers unique century-old architecture and excellent panorama of the tiny state.
• Palazzo Pubblico – the town hall of the City of San Marino as well as its official Government Building, where the official ceremonies of the Republic are held.
• Piazza della Liberta – glorious medieval charm architecture; the square is surrounded by the most important governmental buildings, restaurants and in the center fountain with sumptuous Statue of Liberty of San Marino is located.
• The smallest country by population to have won an Olympic medal at Tokyo Summer Olympic Games in 2020.

I visited the world’s oldest sovereign state, dating from the 4^th century AD, during summer holidays on the Italian coast.

San Marino, surrounded completely by Italy, with an area of only 61 square kilometers and 33,000 inhabitants, portraits an idyllic microstate with its own government and laws.

Three fortresses sit atop the long range, overlooking the land far beyond the country’s borders.

I traveled to San Marino with my family during a trip along the Adriatic Coast in Northern Italy. The fifth-smallest country in the world actually seems as part of Italy: the same language, architecture, food, currency and customs. Only the island nations of Tuvalu, Nauru, city-states Monaco and Vatican are smaller in territory than San Marino.

Leaders officially consolidated San Marino as a political entity in the late 1200s. It has never lost its territory through various invasions. The country opened a paid postal service to all residents in 1607, remained neutral during World War II and granted citizenship to the most famous admirer Abraham Lincoln.

San Marino is the least visited country in Europe. Spending a few hours walking around is enough to see its main landmarks.

The country has a long history of competing in the Olympics, starting in 1960. Finally, at Tokyo 2020 summer Olympic games, San Marino athletes won 3 medals (two in shooting and one in wrestling). This made it the smallest country by population to win an Olympic medal.

I couldn’t notice any particular difference between Italy and San Marino, besides official symbols – flags, colors, car plates, police. Language, food, habits, traditions are totally comparable. A border exists between the two countries, but there are no real checkpoints for cars or people.

Eight of the nine municipalities have little of interest, while the capital, with the beautiful medieval castle at the top of the hill is the place where all the tourists go.

Instead of tourist attractions, I rather remember torta tre monti, a lovely dessert that is considered to be the national dessert of San Marino. Five layers of fragrant round wafers filled with cocoa cream, coffee and hazelnuts, finished with an external crown of dark chocolate.