Cesenatico () is a port town with about 26,000 inhabitants on the Adriatic coast of Italy. It is located in the province of Forlì-Cesena in the region of Emilia-Romagna, about south of Ravenna. Cesenatico's port canal was surveyed and drawn by Leonardo da Vinci at the request of Cesare Borgia, as part of his plans to fortify the nearby town of Cesena. History Cesenatico was founded in 1302. It was considered part of the city of Cesena until it was incorporated at the beginning of the 18th century. Its port and canal were built in 1314, with the canal originally planned to reach Cesena, some inland. At the request of Cesare Borgia the canal was later surveyed by Leonardo da Vinci. It is often erroneously claimed that da Vinci designed the canal. In 1722 James Francis Edward Stuart (the 'Old Pretender' to the British throne) stayed in Cesenatico's Capuchin monastery. From 1860 to today The Republican vocation of Cesenatico is evident in the elections of the following years, but this did not naturally prevent it from escaping fascism. The war damages were so enormous that it had to be rebuilt almost entirely. The municipal building, the aqueduct tower, the lighthouse, the pier and all the boats, the fish market, the schools as well as the villages of Villalta, Sala, Cannucceto, Villamarina, Bagnarola practically razed to the ground. The nightmare vanished on October 20, 1944, with the entry of the New Zealand allies. The restoration and reconstruction work was immediately restarted. In 1945 the fishermen's cooperative was founded and a new impulse was given to the tourism that will lead Cesenatico to excel in this field. Many of the old "villas" were converted into hotels, new colonies were started (one of the first was the 12 Star Colony, aimed at children from the autonomous province of Bolzano, without language distinctions), and the construction of the famous skyscraper gave launching a new era focused on mass tourism. Today Cesenatico has about 22,000 beds with 3 million admissions per season. In 1966 the municipal library was founded; in the same year the coastal city was one of the first municipalities in Europe to start twinning projects with other cities. In 1977 a project of historical-archaeological recovery was brought to light and in the eighties the guidelines were introduced that launched Cesenatico from a global and European perspective. Monuments and places of interest Museums