Since 2017, taking sand home as a souvenir from the beaches of Sardinia has been illegal—but yet another visitor to the Italian island apparently didn't get that memo. Local authorities say a French tourist was busted at Cagliari Elmas Airport on Sept. 1, trying to leave with a bottle filled with 4.4 pounds of sand. The sand was confiscated, and the man was ordered to pay a $1,200 fine—a penalty that can go as high as $3,550, depending on where the sand was taken from and how much someone tries to lift, a rep for the island's Forest Rangers tells CNN. "These behaviors not only harm the environment but also compromise the maintenance of the coastline for the sustainable development of tourism in Sardinia," a statement from local authorities notes, per the Independent.
The Forest Rangers rep said the bottle of sand now sits in a special "operating room" where all such things go. "At the end of the year we usually have many bottles of sand accumulated," the rep says. The New York Daily News notes that Sardinia isn't the only island paradise that has to keep an eye out for people swiping souvenirs off the beach. On the Greek island of Skiathos, you could see a fine of more than $1,100 if you pocket a pebble, while taking sand from Hawaiian shorelines could set you back the cost of a lifetime of vacations: $100,000. (More Sardinia stories.)
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