The start is on the dune, the ribbon of sand that holds the sea on one side and the lake on the other. It is not a beach to cross in a hurry: it is high, covered with juniper and sea lilies, and from up there the eye takes in the whole promontory. The Circeo stands in front, dark, with the coast curving around it. For the next four hours you never leave this landscape. The pace is slow on purpose. First you look at the mountain, then you go down towards the still water.

Lake Paola is the water that lies behind the dune. It has no waves: it is a long mirror, closed in by the reed bed, and in the still hours the Circeo can be read inside it. You follow the shore between the rushes and the open stretches, where the bottom turns pale and the boats stay motionless. This is the moment when the route stops being only sea and becomes park. There is no climbing here yet. You stay low, at water level, with the mountain looking closer than it is.

The tower closes the lake on the promontory side. It stands on the channel that joins Paola to the sea, and from here the walk changes direction: you no longer follow the shore, you head towards the mountain. It is a sixteenth-century watchtower, low and massive, placed so as to hold together the lake’s outlet and the coast. For the route it is the turning point. You leave the still water, cross the channel with your eyes, and enter the scrub.

The path climbs the flank of the Circeo without hurrying. The scrub is thick, the wind comes in gusts, and the sea appears only when the path opens onto a stretch of rock. You walk among mastic and strawberry trees, and your stride shortens by itself because the ground rises and the shade is short. This is not a summit to conquer. It is the stretch where the dune, left behind, turns small, and the promontory stops being a backdrop.

At the lighthouse you stop. The sea is below, wide open, and the inland is left behind: Sabaudia and the lakes shrink to a pale strip. It is the highest point of the route, not for the metres but for the view. From here the four hours make sense: you can see where you set out from and you can see the coast running on westwards. The stop is not long. It is there to catch your breath and to turn around, before going down.

You come back to the same dune, but the light is no longer that of the start. The Circeo, which at the beginning was ahead, is now behind you, and the sand has another colour. The route closes where it began, after lake, tower, scrub and lighthouse. There is no arrival different from the departure: the end is recognising the place. Four hours, the same territory, a slow pace, and the coastal strip that stays there, between the sea and the still water.