For a while, Union Lido seemed determined to build the most beautiful wash block in the world. The high point is W15.
The toilets there are no longer little cubicles but lofty rooms. Individual rooms throughout, elaborate design, large National Geographic maps as decoration. A wash block whose architecture someone had spent a long time thinking about.
It looks magnificent — for a toilet and shower block, at least.
The only problem is that getting to the toilet is harder. Or into the shower.
The individual rooms take up space. So there are fewer of them. You queue for the toilets. The elaborate cubicles and designer fittings are harder to keep clean. Of all places, one of the campsite’s most beautiful wash blocks sometimes looks less well cared for than the simpler ones.
W15 is still there. But the facilities renovated later are different: more modern than their white-tiled predecessors too, with warm colours and marble. Still designed with care, just with more capacity again. Some wash blocks have even been extended.
We do not know whether this was a deliberate move away from W15. But a very beautiful idea is not automatically a very good one.
Just do not spoil anything
A bad campsite has a simple problem: it has to get better.
A successful campsite has a harder problem: it has to get better even though its customers return precisely because they like it as it is.
At Union Lido, many of those customers have been returning for years or decades. Every change meets people who know exactly what it was like before. We are among them.
We have been coming here for about 25 years. We still remember where the Pista Verde was, how many barbecue areas there were and when bicycles had to be pushed across large parts of the campsite. And we remember quite clearly what happened when the Dog Camp was announced.
Until then, dogs had not merely been unwelcome. No dogs was part of the concept. Now a dog beach was to occupy precisely the stretch where we liked to spread our blanket.
There was considerable uproar on the campsite. The beach would get smaller. Dogs would be running around everywhere. What about the children? What about aggressive dogs? Why change a concept that was clearly working?
We were not much more relaxed about it ourselves.
In 2015, the Dog Camp arrived anyway. But the dogs and their owners did not simply move into Union Lido. They received an area of their own: their own pitches and accommodation, their own beach, pools, exercise areas, training and care.
In the first year, the change really was noticeable. Our old spot on the beach was gone. Not every dog was pleasant. Then things settled down.
These days, even we occasionally enjoy going into the Dog Camp. Sometimes we stop by the pool and watch the dogs swimming. Our favourite restaurant at Union Lido is now there. And on the beach, our blanket lies right at the edge of the dog area.
Commercially, the Dog Camp became a success.
As early as 1955
None of this is new.
The campsite opened in 1955 as NSU Lido. Yes, that NSU — the one that made motorcycles and cars and later became part of Audi’s history through Auto Union.
In the early 1950s, NSU was looking for a way to offer employees and motorcyclists holidays in Italy. The Italian importers Angelo Macola and Ignazio Vok developed the idea into an Adriatic campsite together with a camping expert from Germany’s ADAC motoring club.
Even that first campsite was meant to be more than a field by the sea: hot water, places to eat, first aid, electricity, shade. Later came a hotel, bungalows, more bungalows and sports facilities.
Comfort is no later invention at Union Lido. It is part of the founding idea.
The campsite kept expanding its facilities. Water parks, new types of accommodation, wellness facilities, larger pitches, private bathrooms. In 1994, Union Lido was one of the three founding campsites of LeadingCampings of Europe. In 2015, it became the first campsite in Italy to receive five-star classification.
Not everything stayed. That is the more important part of the story.
Fewer pitches, more potential
Union Lido now covers around 60 hectares and has more than 2,500 pitches. There is not much more land to add.
So pitches were removed.
Yes, removed.
Not all of them, of course. But their number was reduced to make others larger. Some pitches now measure 160 or 200 square metres. Sometimes with private bathrooms too.
The managing director was once asked what he would do with an unlimited budget and additional land. His answer: not take in more guests. Give the existing guests more space.
The apparent paradox is simple: growth does not have to mean fitting ever more people into the same area.
A larger pitch can be worth more than two small ones. A mobile home is a different product from a pitch. A private bathroom changes what guests are willing to pay for again. If you fill every square metre today, you have none left to try something new tomorrow.
The traditional caravan among the trees has not disappeared, though. It has simply acquired company. Or more space.
How does it work this year?
Some experiments are less spectacular. Pitch registration, for example.
Long ago, there was practically nothing to register. You could not book anyway. You drove in, found a pitch and stayed there. Later, you chose your own pitch and registered it at fixed terminals. Then through the app.
This year, we were allocated a pitch at check-in. You could still change it; you just had to report the change afterwards.
Perhaps occupancy improved. Perhaps traffic around the campsite. Perhaps planning. We do not know.
We only know that the procedure changes surprisingly often. Like quite a few details on this campsite. After 25 years, you can know every path and still not be sure how you will get your pitch this year.
Three months
Alongside space, something else is in short supply: time.
Union Lido now opens in April. This year, we were there a week before the Whitsun school holidays. The campsite was emptier than empty. Then the holidays began. A few days later, it was almost full.
Being open is not the same as being in season.
Cavallino-Treporti is one of the most seasonal tourism destinations in Veneto. Much of the local economy depends on summer: campsites, restaurants, shops, cleaning services, bicycle hire, tradespeople, gardeners.
A substantial share of the year’s revenue has to be earned in a few months.
It is a peculiar parallel world. We sit outside the caravan trying not to look at the clock. Behind the scenes, every well-booked day is precious.
The shoulder seasons are becoming more important. Seasonal contracts are getting longer. Guests who are not tied to school holidays matter more too. But summer cannot be extended indefinitely.
Eventually, autumn reaches the Adriatic.
Without the sea
That is why the next experiment is no longer by the sea.
Union Lido Terme opens in Montegrotto in early 2027. All year round. With thermal pools, mobile homes, pitches with private bathrooms and, in some cases, even private thermal pools.
On paper, this solves a problem: thermal water works in January too. Whether camping in the Po Valley works in January is another question.
In winter, it is often grey, damp and chilly there. A private thermal pool helps. But even after bathing, you remain a guest at an open-air resort.
Perhaps that is precisely what will work.
What remains of Union Lido without summer? What remains without the sea?
That is hard to find out sitting at a desk.