Pietrasanta, not Forte.

We were at Paradis our first night. The four of us — my parents, my brother Redford, and me — sat on the terrace. The sculptor and his friend were at the table next to ours.

We started talking because the tables were next to each other. He was English. He had come to Pietrasanta to arrange the pick-up of a ten-foot block of marble for his next project. He is also a fly fisherman, he said, and his favourite film is A River Runs Through It. My dad asked him to ask my brother his name. My brother — who is seventeen — said, "Redford. Named after Robert Redford."

Pietrasanta is the sculptors' town. The Italians call it Little Athens. The marble itself is quarried up the coast at Carrara; the carving is done here. That is most of what I want you to know.

If you search this coast on Instagram, you will find five places. The famous hotel terrace. The waterside restaurant with the langoustines. The beach club owned by the famous tenor. The same pool, the same plate, the same edited light at sunset.

The most luxurious version of the Versilia is easy to find. The piece you are reading is about the rest of it.

My family came to Italy this June to celebrate the end of my four years at Polimoda. We arrived on the Versilia on a Sunday and spent the next two days at the umbrella, and then drove inland to a Medici estate. We chose the early week on purpose — the tourists come on the weekend; we came as they were leaving. The Versilia is the part of the weekend my parents asked me to write about. The Versilia is mine because my boyfriend, Fede, is from here.

Pietrasanta, not Forte. The slow life of the hills, not the fast life at the beach. That is the editorial argument of the whole trip — and the timing is half of it.

Three generations at Aretusa

Fede is thirty. His grandfather once had a house in Forte dei Marmi. Fede has been on this coast since he was born.

The bagni on the Italian coast operate on inheritance. The umbrellas are not bought; they are held. A family's chairs sit one row farther back than the year before, and the families ahead, slowly, stop coming. After forty summers at Aretusa in Pietrasanta, Fede's family is finally in row one.

We were at the umbrella on a Monday morning in early June. The season had not opened, and the weekend tourists had gone home. No more than ten other people were on the beach the entire day. The few who were there were the people who live here. Row one was almost ours. The Apuan Alps were on the inland horizon, and the Tyrrhenian was three steps from the chair.

We could have gone to Alpemare instead — Andrea Bocelli's beach club, the Instagram name on this coast. We asked for prices. Alpemare wanted four hundred euros a day for a tent in the middle rows. We did not go.

Go in early June if you can. Better, go on a Monday in early June.

Forte dei Marmi — the market, the bikes, the lunches

We arrived on a Sunday and the Forte dei Marmi market was already shutting down. By one o'clock the stalls were packing up. If you go for the market, go before noon.

One of the things we love about Forte is the bikes. The town is flat and generous and built for them. You see locals riding to the market with a baguette in the basket. You see grandmothers riding home in the late afternoon with grandchildren on the rear rack. We do not say Pietrasanta not Forte because Forte is unlovable. We say it because Forte is where everyone else is.

There are two places we eat in Forte.

Bonanza is Fede's family's lunch. My dad called it "absolutely zero fancy or luxurious" and he meant it warmly. Simple, local, a limited menu, the kind of seaside lunch that has not changed in years. No one at the tables around us was speaking English. The owners were not either. That is the register of the room. We had gnocchi con gamberi and fritto misto — shrimp, calamari, octopus — and Aperol spritzes before the food. (The Aperol spritz is fine here. It is not fine everywhere — see Paradis, below.)

Bagni Alaide is the other one. We went there for the fritto misto with the fried anchovies. The fried anchovy is the best thing on the plate when a kitchen includes it — and not every kitchen does. Bonanza did not. Alaide did. That is the difference between the meal you have because it is local and the meal you go back for.

There is one dish I order on this coast whenever it is on the menu: spaghetti arselle. Arselle are the small wedge clams that live in the sand along the Versilia — piccole, pallide, dolci. The pasta is white: garlic, olive oil, white wine, parsley, the clams. I ordered it at almost every meal this trip where the kitchen had it — and not every kitchen does, but most do. It is the dish I have been ordering on this coast for as long as I have been coming.

Paradis — and what to order

Paradis is in Pietrasanta. It is a hotel and a restaurant and a bar.

The bar is the move. Paradis has some of the best cocktails in Italy and a seasonal menu that changes through the year. When the seasonal menu is on, sit at the bar or on the terrace, ask the bartender what he is making this month, and let him choose. We were between seasons when we came, so we went with favourites: a smoky margarita and a French 75. Both were excellent.

Do not order wine; the cocktails are the reason you are there. And do not look like a tourist by ordering an Aperol spritz. There is a place for the Aperol spritz on this coast (see Bonanza, above) and Paradis is not it.

The merenda that came with the drinks — the Italian late-afternoon small plate — was fiori di zucca fritti with pecorino and beans. Simple, beautifully done. Order it.

It is also the answer to the hotel question on this coast, if a hotel is the question. The version of the Versilia I keep going back to does not have a famous name on the door.

Dinner in the garden — Da Giacomo

Da Giacomo is in Pietrasanta — the Versilia outpost of the Da Giacomo group in Milan. We had dinner there our first night, in the garden, after the cocktails at Paradis. The garden was full. Most of the languages at the tables around us were not Italian; Da Giacomo has crossed the Atlantic. That is not a critique. Bonanza and Da Giacomo are two different rooms; both are good; you should know which one you are walking into.

We had vitello tonnato — thin roast veal in tuna sauce. Fritto misto di pesce e verdure — prawns, langoustines, calamari, vegetables. Filetto al pepe verde e millefoglie di patate — beef fillet with green peppercorn sauce and a potato millefeuille. Then the fish of the day for two, which the waiter brought to us as a whole scorfano — a scorpion fish.

The bill for the scorfano was over two hundred euros. My dad said it was good. He also said it was not two hundred euros of good. If you order the fish of the day at Da Giacomo, ask the price. I wish someone had told us before the bill arrived.

We finished with tiramisu and an apple crumble with zabaione. We drank a bottle of '61 Nature Rosé Pinot Nero 2018 — Berlucchi, the Franciacorta. Italian sparkling rosé on a warm evening. That is what the Italians drink.

Where to stay

The honest answer for me is that I have been lucky. Fede grew up on this coast. His family has been at Aretusa for forty summers, and his grandfather had a house in Forte. When I am here in the summer, I am usually here with them. That is a gift I have been given by knowing Fede, and I am grateful for it. It is not something a guide can hand you.

For everyone else — anyone who is not lucky in the same way — the answer is Pietrasanta, not Forte. The hills, not the beach.

The five of us, this June, stayed in an Airbnb in Pietrasanta. Three bedrooms, three bathrooms, a large pool, mountain views, a large garden. A five-minute walk to the village in every direction. It is the practical answer for a family. If you would like the listing, send us a message — we are happy to pass it on.

For a couple, or for a quiet stay, the answer is Paradis. The hotel and the bar are the same address.

We did not stay in Forte dei Marmi. We do not, and there is a reason. The Instagram version of this coast — the famous hotels, the four-hundred-euro tents — is easy to find. The version we go back to is one town inland and a generation deeper into the relationships.

Before you book

A few qualifiers, in the brand's habit of putting them at the bottom of the piece.

The bagni on this coast open as the Italian summer arrives, and the busiest weeks are around Ferragosto in mid-August. Early June is the contrarian window — the umbrella you wait forty summers for is almost empty around you, the kitchens are open, and the heat has not pushed into the upper thirties. And the contrarian week inside it is Monday through Wednesday. The tourists arrive on Saturday; they leave on Sunday. The Italians who live here come in the middle. If you arrive on a Sunday afternoon and leave on a Wednesday morning, you will have the umbrella mostly to yourselves.

The fish of the day at Da Giacomo can be a surprise. Ask the price.

Beach-club day rates on this coast — at Alpemare and the comparable places — run into the hundreds of euros per tent per day, depending on the row and the season. There is nothing wrong with paying for it if you have it. There is also nothing wrong with not.

If you go into Forte for the day, ride a bike. And go to the Sunday market before noon. The town was made for the first; the market is mostly gone by one.

If you order the fritto misto on this coast, ask whether the kitchen includes fried anchovies. At Bagni Alaide, they do.

And if you see spaghetti arselle on the menu, order it. It is the regional pasta.

The drive from Pisa airport to Pietrasanta is well under an hour. The drive from Forte dei Marmi to Pietrasanta is a few minutes. Staying inland gives nothing up.

I am on Elba this week — Bagnaia, not Porto Azzurro — and I will write about that next.

— Hannah, for the team.