Many wonderful words have been written on the Gulf of Tigullio and Portofino by novelists, poets and plain travellers enchanted by these places where tradition and nature blend with high society. It is not a case if Portofino has always hosted important personalities that have made and continue to make history. Once these were popes, sovereigns, noblewomen; today they are movie stars, famous names of literature and of music, big names of fashion. Behind the stage of the well-known boutiques and of billionaire yachts, the Mediterranean scrub of the Nature Park stretches out luxuriant and unspoilt, crossed by many paths where still today the tracks of an ancient peasant civilisation are preserved. l
After Portofino, along the bay of Tigullio, Lavagna, Chiavari, Zoagli, Rapallo and Santa Margherita follow. These charming maritime villages, even if different one from the other, have in common the uniqueness of the Ligurian landscape that is strongly present in the art, culture, environment, cuisine and folklore of each single place

Portus Delphini, or better the port of the dolphins, so called by Pliny in the third book of Naturalis Historia, is a simple fishing village, with narrow coloured houses, closely built one to the other, crossed by many roads, that lead to the well-known square of polished pebbles already famous in the whole world. Here, high society and nature blend together: the Portofino shelter for VIPs, crossing of famous people and the the Park and of the Natural Protected Area with its paths, the Mediterranean scrub, the deep seabed.
It has always hosted celebrities. Once these were popes, sovereigns, noblewomen, poets and writers, today they are mainly movie stars and TV stars, famous names in literature and music, big names in the world of fashion. The list of personalities that have stopped at the legendary square of polished pebbles, that have shopped in the well-known boutiques of the old streets called carruggi, that have dined in the typical restaurants of Calata Marconi or that have moored their yachts at the Molo Umberto (Umberto wharf),is never ending.
Among the personalities of important historical events, Pope Gregory XI, who passed the bay escorted by thirty-one ships, returning from Rome after the "Avignon imprisonment", should be mentioned. The passing is recalled by a tombstone preserved in the Church of San Martino. Among the sovereigns, King Richards of England, King Ferdinand of Spain, William II, Emperor of Germany guest at San Giorgio Castle owned by the baron Alfons Von Schwarzenstein, ambassador of the Kaiser in Orient.