Europe's best bathing waters

Cyprus was ranked best in the EU for the water quality of its beaches for the second year in a row: All of Cyprus's bathing sites were deemed excellent. The European Environment Agency (EEA) released its annual water quality survey just in time for vacationers to pick out the best shores for this summer.

The tiny landlocked Grand Duchy of Luxembourg was the only other country with a 100-percent record. Its longest river is the Sauer, shown here on a stretch in the country's northern Ardennes region, where bathers like to head for swimming and boating.

Ninety-nine percent of the bathing sites, such as the Blue Lagoon beach shown here, were ranked as excellent in Malta. Overall, almost 95 percent of bathing waters in the Union met minimum EU water quality standards.

Croatia, with a 95-percent record, ranked a close third behind Malta. "Europe's bathing water has improved over the last two decades - we no longer discharge such high quantities of sewage directly into water bodies," EEA Chief Hans Bruyninckx says.

In effect a summary of the 2013 bathing season, the EEA's report ranked Greece next with 93 percent of its bathing sites achieving a rating of "excellent." A total of 2,155 bodies of water in Greece were tested for levels of bacteria from sewage and livestock.

The European Environment Agency tested water quality at more than 22,000 beach, river and lake sites across Europe last year. In Germany, about 90 percent were rated excellent, and 97 percent met the minumum water quality standards. Swimming lakes abound and are highly popular on hot summer days.

Other countries lag behind. Belgium and The Netherlands, with their many rivers and endless North Sea coasts, were among the "worst" performers: Four and five percent, respectively, of the countries' swimming sites were rated as having poor water quality.

Estonia is on the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea. Some six percent of its bathing sites failed to meet EU standards, landing the country in the lowest ranking.