Description
This splendid, secluded beach, with Caribbean colors and perhaps the clearest sea on the entire island (where light reaches depths of over 50 meters), is hard to reach. It can be found by following the paved road from La Finiccia towards Le Cale and is marked by a sign from the Tuscan Archipelago National Park just where the dirt road begins.
Descending the steep path through Mediterranean scrub down to the sea, you are greeted by a natural spectacle of large white stones and boulders—a wild place perched beneath Punta della Madonna, the most beautiful panoramic balcony of Elba, overlooking Corsica, Capraia, Gorgona, the Tuscan mainland, and breathtaking sunsets.
Such an untouched and peaceful place that even the rare Corsican gulls—with their red and black beaks, green legs, and a diet of only live fish—have chosen it as home. Ripa Barata (meaning “collapsed coast” in the local dialect) is a stunning but “inconvenient” beach, to be used with care, quietly, while breathing in its beauty and silence.
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