20 Sep 2022 Amalfi Coast – The Road to Enchantment

The August crowds have left the beaches and Italian children are getting ready for school. My sister and I decide to take a road trip somewhere in Italy from our respective homes in Rome. It doesn’t take long to settle on a destination we both love – the Costiera Amalfitana – 35 miles of staggeringly beautiful coastline meandering south from Naples.

The only shortcoming I can report on our whimsical road trip is that it was too short. Next time we’ll try for June and make it two weeks. Che bella cosa!

There is no better example of the genius of man merging with the bounty of nature to create a unique scene. Here, a dramatic cliffside overlooking the turquoise sea is rich with the colors and scents of a wildly beautiful natural landscape made more exquisite with cosmopolitan Arab-Mediterranean architecture and colorful majolica church domes built upon terraces above the sea. It’s an easy four-hour drive from Rome until you actually arrive on the coast road. John Steinbeck described it as “a road, high, high above the blue sea, that hooked and corkscrewed on the edge of nothing, a road carefully designed to be a little narrower than two cars side by side.” That’s still true; the mesmerizing views are so distracting it’s a wonder that more cars don’t collide.

Despite our late arrival, the gracious owners of the villa are there with the keys and welcoming gifts of fresh figs from their tree, a homemade pound cake for breakfast and a bottle of their own limoncello. The house is picture perfect. Flooded with natural light, cool, clean lines, blue and white tiles reflecting the sun, and a drop-dead vista from the terrace. There’s another sea-view terrace off the master bedroom private enough for nude sunbathing. Two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a living area all on slightly different levels with the world at our feet.

Sunday promises brilliant sunshine, so we are off to our local beach again, Marina di Praia, predictably crowded today since all the townspeople are here too. In a relatively tiny cove beach, three restaurants and a beach club renting sun beds and umbrellas vie for space. I enjoy the people watching, and we both feel like insiders in this dramatic natural cove rather than on a platform hotel beach peopled with other foreign guests. The sea is crystal clear and exhilarating. I float out and feast on the gorgeous scenery with my eyes.

Time for a little exploring on Monday. We’ve heard there is a boat leaving from Marina di Praia for a more expansive beach about ten minutes away called Gavitella. The round-trip boat ride is free if you eat at the only restaurant there. That sounds fine to us, but when we arrive, we find we also have complimentary sun beds and an umbrella, plus a choice corner table on the restaurant’s terrace.

Dinner is a delicious chicken salad put together at home which I find so relaxing I turn in early.

I remember on my first visit to the Costiera Amalftana in the 1980’s a local aristocrat told me “the coast must be seen from the sea,” so we book a boat tour (maximum eight people) for the next day along the coastline. As we reach the dock the sun is burning off early morning cloudiness, which probably discouraged fellow explorers. A traditional yellow fishing boat is waiting outfitted with soft mattresses for sunbathing, large beach towels and a cooler of cold soft drinks and beer. As it happens we are the only two passengers.

After a swing by Positano, arguably the most radiant of the coastal towns, we head toward the Fjord di Furore, the only fjord in Italy. The boat enters right into the inlet under the bridge above on the coast road where the Italian diving championships are held every September. A few scattered houses built between the dramatically steep cliffs look like a Scandinavian crèche scene.

As we pass ancient towns, I pick out the exquisite Byzantine architectural features and count the Saracen towers built along the coast a thousand years ago to look out for marauding pirates. We stop for a swim at the Arco Naturale, a natural rock arch where the water is deep emerald and clear straight to the bottom six meters down. Naturally, local boatmen know the best spots to stop.

One day of a sojourn to the Amalfi Coast needs to be reserved for shopping and visiting art galleries in Positano. Our day there is made perfect by a light lunch at the elegant Hotel Sirenuse. On the legendary luxury inn’s terrace, you are surrounded by Positano and the sea, within one of the truly splendid scenes on the planet.

Of course, even Paradise needs the rain, but this is one seaside location where cloudy weather and a few showers won’t dampen the experience. There is so much to do and see nearby that choosing is the problem.

We visit Villa Rufolo, the garden that inspired Richard Wagner’s garden of Klingsor in “Parsifal” and whose amazing views of the cliffs over the sea certainly make this the most spectacular venue for a three-month annual music festival in the world. After a drink at one of the fabulous hotels along the Belvedere on Via San Giovanni del Toro (still catching those vistas) we visit Villa Cimbrone, where romantic era sculpture groups accentuate the rare beauty of the panorama. Just west of Ravello, from the town of Scala, some of the most memorable hiking trails ever imagined cross the cliffs plunging toward the sea.