A couple of years ago, when the planning for “our travels”, as we like to call them, began in earnest, I somehow heard of the delicious lemons that grew on the Amalfi Coast.
The image of lemon groves clinging to rocky hillsides tumbling down to the blue Mediterranean stuck in my head and refused to budge. Before we knew it, the Amalfi Coast was on “The List”. For no other reason than I wanted to see the lemon groves.
And yes, taste that sweet, sweet Limoncello.
When I was researching areas in which we could stay, Positano kept coming up as the unanimous “most beautiful town” on the coast, so we found what seemed like a nice apartment there and booked it. It was a bit over budget, but it looked like it had a pretty good view so we took a flyer on it.
We left Rome on the Frecciarossa, Italy’s high-speed train, bound for Naples where we subsequently got a car to Positano. We sat in the back seat and watched, transfixed, as the ominous shadow of Mount Vesuvius rose before us. As the terrain grew more mountainous. As the sparkling blue Mediterranean came into view. As the car wound its way through towns that seemed to defy gravity, clinging stubbornly to the edge of picturesque cliffs dangling over the sea.
Our driver dropped us off on the small, one-lane road that runs through Positano, pointed us to a barely visible staircase right next to a small cliffside restaurant, and bid us farewell. We saddled up our bags and descended into a fairy tale. Stone steps led in every direction, snaking between homes perched on the edge of the bluff. Out in front of us were some of the most amazing views we’d ever seen. The pale yellow buildings of Positano spilled down the cliff and into the glittering Mediterranean like a child’s toys.
We found our way down the stairs where the caretaker of our apartment, Maria, and her 5 year-old-daughter, Margherite, were waiting for us. Braeden and Margherite exchanged shy glances as we made introductions, and Maria guided us down the few hundred more steps through the maze of houses to the gate of our villa. She let us in, we dropped our bags, and stared.
Words fail. The view was amazing, the best we’d had of any place since we hit the road nearly a year earlier. We were stunned. The rest of the apartment was beautiful as well, and the whitewashed, cavelike walls of the interior reminded me of pictures of cliffside homes in the Greek Islands I had seen.
We wasted no time dropping our stuff and setting out to explore the town, including grabbing a little lunch at a beachfront restaurant called Chez Black, which sported incredible spaghetti and meatballs and a handsome, flirty maitre’d to whom Juliann took a liking right away.
After our whirlwind week in Rome, we were ready for some down time, and Positano proved the perfect spot for it. We had two weeks to spend there, and most of the time we just lived life: wake up, do a little work, work out, and eat breakfast. Then if we were feeling it, we would explore the town, hit the beach, or do some sightseeing.
Occasionally we would run errands, like the day we went in search of a party store for some fun stuff for Braeden’s upcoming 5th birthday. Maria told us about a place about a 25 minute walk away, so we went looking for it. A 25 minute walk anywhere else would have been a snap, but in Positano that means 25 minutes of stairs, and in this particular case, it meant 25 minutes of stairs straight up. At one point I thought about Sisyphus and how easy he had it: his stone didn’t keep pulling at his hand and asking why they had so many stairs in Positano.
We finally found the store, out of breath and sweating “like bathtubs”, as Braeden now likes to say. It was closed. A kindly man in his fifties told me in Italian that it had recently closed for good, so we had a good sardonic/sad laugh with a few tears thrown in, then set back down the hill on a different route.
Only a couple of minutes later we stumbled on a Tabbachi (read: Convenience store. And tobacco shop. And sometimes a bar) that had all kinds of colorful kids’ stuff hanging outside, and Juliann was able to find balloons and other party favors inside while B and I looked at all the fun toys hanging in the bright afternoon sun.
Braeden ended up being sick on his birthday, so he stayed in bed for most of the day and watched Peppa Pig, a special “you’re sick on your birthday” treat.
We celebrated in force the following day, a Sunday, by opening presents, playing with his new Lego fishing boat, and getting a nice seaside lunch at the Brasserie right below our apartment.
As in Rome, Positano was a bit colder than what we were used to in Thailand, so we didn’t hit the beach right away. Once we did, though, we loved it. The beach itself was small, but big enough for the meager crowds in Positano at the time, and it was a pebble beach instead of sand.
The first time Braeden and I jumped in the water we froze our asses off and immediately ran back to Juliann, who had our towels. We dried off and spent the better part of an hour digging through the pebbles looking for sea glass, which Braeden had never seen before. We got a good handful and Braeden was delighted.
Living the lazy life was great, but we did get out and see some sights on occasion. Juliann scheduled a walking tour with a local woman midway through our stay, which turned out to be fun, informative, and not terribly sweaty. There were, of course, many stairs involved, but Braeden by this time was used to them and he took them like a trooper.
One of the most popular things to do while on the Amalfi Coast is hiking “The Path of the Gods”, a trail that runs the crest of the hills from just west of Amalfi all the way to Positano. One morning we jumped a ferry from Positano to Amalfi right after breakfast, then took a bus from Amalfi to the head of the trail several hundred meters up.
Because Braeden was with us we didn’t hike all the way to Positano. Instead we did just a few miles to the town of Nocelle, but that proved enough.
The trail was incredible. The foliage at the top of the ridge along the Path was mostly shrubs and brush, so we had amazing views of the Med and the coast the entire hike. The trail was a little sketchy for a 5-year-old in some spots (where I held onto Braeden with an iron grip) but the boy was pretty much able to hike on his own most of the way, which he loved.
Another excursion we had heard was a “must-do” was Capri. I wasn’t very interested in spending a day shuffling over to Capri on a ferry, then hoofing all over in taxis just to explore an island that I was pretty sure looked a lot like the coast of Cassis.
I’ve learned, however, that when we hear over and over again that something is a “must-do”, there’s a high probability that we’ll love it. So we went. And we were soooo glad we did.
The ferry to Capri was easy-peasy, and as soon as we set foot on the island we headed over to the waiting tour boats to book a “round the island” trip.
Our plan (stolen from someone online with more experience than us) was to take the boat halfway around to the Blue Grotto, check out the grotto, then say arrivederci to the boat and take a taxi to Anacapri.
Mother Nature messed with our plans, however, as the water level was so high that the Blue Grotto was inaccessible, so we didn’t stop, and we ended up taking the tour all the way around the island.
Which was beautiful. Capri is stunning. True, we’ve seen gorgeous coastline before in many places, but Capri is, well, Capri. If you can see it, go.
The ride was a little rough, and I was a little seasick by the end of it (DAMN YOU, LIMONCELLO!) but we hopped off the boat and skipped over to the taxi stand to wait our turn for one of the wonderfully cool “Capri Taxis”. To create one of their taxis, they take a Fiat or something similar, cut the roof off, and put on an awning to shade the passengers. It’s a little like traveling in a convertible, but Capri-style. We loved it.
We took our taxi, complete with very friendly driver, up to Anacapri, a little town at the base of Monte Solaro, where we hopped onto a chairlift which carried us gently to the top of the mountain.
The views up there were unreal. We’ve seen a lot of amazing blue water, but the sea off Capri is a profound turquoise that I don’t think we’ve seen anywhere else. Mount Vesuvius loomed in the distance like a shimmering vision. The Amalfi Coast stretched out for miles, tumbling down into the sea. It was like a scene from a movie, something you’ve seen a million times on a screen so you don’t really see it any more. But there it was, huge and vast and beautiful, and we stood trying to take it all in, the wind blowing in our faces.
After hanging out at the summit for a bit, we took the trail down, which turned out to be less dramatic than we’d hoped. Back in Anacapri we found a little pizza joint, Aumm Aumm, where we decided we would stuff our hungry bellies.
We ordered our meals and watched the fellow behind the counter roll out the dough for our pizza. He saw Braeden eyeing him intently, so he smiled and waved our son over. Braeden, who had been dying to make his own pizza, cautiously but eagerly walked behind the counter. We watched, beaming, as the man showed Braeden how to roll out the dough, press it into a shape, cover it with sauce and cheese, and (after losing the first one on the floor), put it into the oven.
Once it was in, B ran over to us at top speed. “Mommy, Daddy, I just made a pizza!”
When lunch arrived, he proudly devoured his little pizza with gusto. We thanked the chef and staff profusely and headed back to the taxi stand, where we snagged a cab that would take us back down to our ferry.
It was a delightful day, and Capri turned out to be a very good call. It’s definitely a place where we could spend a few weeks or months.
Two weeks in Positano blew by, but before we left we had two things to do: Mother’s Day and Pompeii.
For Mother’s Day we took Juliann to Casa E Bottega, a little restaurant I had found that was supposed to have a great brunch, and to our delight there were many other families there celebrating the day with their mothers as well. The food was fantastic – an American-style brunch with Italian touches – and we had a wonderful time.
Then we went to Hotel Palazzo Murat to hang out on their gorgeous terrace, drink mimosas, and play Uno. The boy is getting pretty good at Uno now and beats us regularly. Now if he could just keep his cards up so we can’t see them.
Finally we headed down to the beach to rent a couple of loungers and play in the water. The sea had warmed up a bit since our first beach excursion, so Braeden and I were able to enjoy the water while Juliann relaxed in her lounger with a cold Corona. It was a perfect day, and one much deserved for the best mother and wife I could ask for.
We were very bummed when the time came to leave Positano, mainly because we weren’t sure whether we would get to stay in such a beautiful place again. Our next stop was Florence, which was something to be excited about, but before we got there we stopped in Pompeii to spend a few hours looking around.
Braeden had already read quite a bit about Pompeii and seen several videos, so he was thrilled to finally be there. It was quite busy but the site was so huge that we were able to get away from the crowds pretty easily. We failed to see the most popular building, however: the brothel. The line was just too long and we didn’t have enough time to wait.
There’s a joke in there somewhere.
We were only in Pompeii for a couple of hours, which was nowhere near enough time for us. If we go back, we will definitely spend a few days there, combing the streets and looking through all the buildings. It’s a remarkable, chilling place.
Our driver, George, took us and our backpacks from Pompeii to the Naples train station, where we said arrivederci to the coast and boarded our train for Florence, where new adventures waited for us.
Next: Florence!