✈️ Episode 7: The Super Santos Test

✈️ Episode 7: The Super Santos Test

There are certain signs you’ve landed somewhere properly Mediterranean. The smell of espresso in the morning, linen shirts drying on a balcony, scooters weaving through traffic like caffeinated bees or wasps. Incidentally, the name ‘Vespa’ on a scooter is of course, ‘wasp’ in Italian, and if you’ve seen the Piaggio ape, then, well, ‘Ape’ is ‘bee’ in Italian. Anyway, then there’s the ultimate one, a bright orange Super Santos bouncing across the sand.

The Super Santos isn’t just a football. It’s the football. A lightweight plastic sphere of chaos, born in Italy but adopted across beaches and piazzas everywhere. You don’t play a match with a Super Santos, you survive it. A gentle tap sends it flying unpredictably into the sea, over a sun lounger, or straight into someone’s Negroni. Nobody minds. That’s part of the deal.

For generations of Italians, this was summer: barefoot, sunburnt shoulders, three a side with cousins and strangers until sunset. The ball wasn’t precious it was cheap enough that if it drifted out to sea, you shrugged and bought another. But the memories stuck harder than salt on your skin.

I’ve always loved spotting one on my travels… now, I’m in Italy, it’s hard not to spot them. It tells me everything I need to know about a place, that kids are still making their own fun, that the culture of play and chaos hasn’t been ironed out by hotel rules and overpriced loungers. Once, in Sicily, I ditched the tourist beach entirely and found myself on a patch of coast where locals were blasting music, passing around snacks, and yes booting a Super Santos into the waves, laughing every time someone had to swim after it. Best day.

So here’s my new travel tip, forget guidebooks, forget TripAdvisor reviews. Just look for the orange ball. If it’s there, you’re probably in the right spot.

What’s the one object or sound that instantly tells you you’ve landed in the right place?