Rapallo in springtime is a festival of flowers. All the public spaces have been freshly planted with cheerful pansies, petunias, calendulas, and lots of other flowers I can’t identify.

There is a special floral tribute to Easter each year, usually on the Lungomare across from the bandstand. This year, probably due to bandstand construction, it was near that other famous Rapallo landmark, the Polipo (octopus).  He’s looking a little dejected just now, isn’t he?

The supports for the bells were decorated with other flowers for Easter, no doubt, but by the time I came upon the display those flowers had gone past. The bell flowers were on their last legs, but still make quite a show.

I love the way the giardinieri think nothing of decorating with trees. Every now and then olive trees will appear in the middle of a piazza where they’ve never been before, and then a month or two later just as mysteriously disappear. Last week there was a mature lemon tree ‘growing’ out of a piazza.  Limoncello, anyone?

Rapallo takes its appearance very seriously.  The flowers will be kept healthy and flowering as long as possible, and when their work is done they will be replaced by new recruits.  It’s just one of the many pleasures of living in this pretty town.