On September 12th, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, your correspondent travelled on a Rome-Turin-Rome day return flight. Finding space on Alitalia's busy internal routes is often a problem, writes Paddy Agnew in Rome

On that particular day, however, there were just six passengers on the way up to Turin and five on the way back. While waiting for the return flight, I stopped for a meal at the airport restaurant. Here I sat, ate and meditated in solitary splendour being the only customer of the evening.

Somewhat puzzled, I asked the waitress if the restaurant was normally so empty, even allowing for the fact that we were in midweek. She looked at me as if I were some fool, the only person in the world unaware of the horrendous events of the previous day in the USA, saying: "After what happened yesterday, nobody is going to travel today, are they?"

Two years on, Italians are again showing signs of a "cautious prudence" with regard to travel, especially international travel.

In the wake of a winter and spring dominated by the war in Iraq, the SARS epidemic and the notion of a globalised economic downturn, Italians are playing it canny regarding their summer holidays, opting in increased numbers for the relatively risk-free security of holidays in Italy itself.

According to a joint report by the tourist industry research units, Trademark and Sociometrica, 69 per cent of those Italians who take holidays will opt to stay at home this year, a jump of nearly a quarter on the 52.9 per cent of Italian holidaymakers who chose Italy last year.

In fairness, the Trademark report is quick to point out that its research is indicative rather than definitive for the good reason that up to 70 per cent of the 2,122 people consulted in its survey have yet to decide definitely where (in Italy) and when they will go on holidays.

What is certain, however, is that, as of this spring, only 4.8 per cent of Italians indicated they would be taking a "foreign" holiday, a drop on the 6.3 per cent figure last year.

Media critics and tourism industry analysts alike are already suggesting that the increased "stay at home" tendency will prompt a definitive price rise in the cost of Italian holidays.

Be it the exclusive Costa Smeralda in Sardinia, the upmarket Tuscan resort of Forte di Marmi, downmarket Rimini on the Adriatic, Madonna di Campiglio in the Dolomites, or the island of Ischia, the initial indications are that everyone will be paying more in Italy this summer in a simple case of the market responding to the basic pointer of supply and demand.

According to the nationwide real estate trader Gabetti, price hikes of 4-5 per cent can be expected, depending of course on the time and place.

By way of indication, it estimates the following prices for one week's rent of an apartment catering for four to five people during the August high season:

Porto Cervo (Sardinia) € 3,950;

Rimini €2,500;

Forte di Marmi €3,700;

Madonna di Campiglio €2,300;

Santa Margherita (Ligurian riviera) €4,100.

Such prices do not seem to fit in with Trademark's calculation that the basic Italian family unit (2.4 people for statistical purposes) will spend €1,110 on their family holiday this summer. The apparent discrepancy, however, is soon explained. For a start, the "cautious prudence", not to say overall glum economic climate, means a large number of Italians, perhaps up to 40 per cent, will not take holidays at all.

For a second, many take holidays within an extended family context, taking turns to use a family house by the sea, in the countryside or in the mountains.

Furthermore, 6 per cent of Italian families will take their holidays either in camper vans (which have already registered a 15 per cent increase in rental numbers) or using camping sites.

The one-time Italian obsession with the exotic foreign holiday, although clearly on the wane, has not entirely disappeared.

Trademark and Sociometrica conclude that while destinations such as Australia, Thailand, Polynesia and the US have lost ground due to concern on SARS and terrorism, old favourites such as Cuba, the Maldives and Sherm el Sheik in Egypt are all holding up.

It would seem that the bottom line, at least as far as the Irish tourist in Italy is concerned, is to prepare for a relatively expensive holiday in which the high cost of basic infrastructural services will admittedly be partly offset by the relatively low (by Irish standards) cost of those quintessential tourist requirements, namely food and drink.

As for the Turin airport restaurant, one suspects it could have some lean midsummer nights ahead.