Travel - Positano and The Amalfi Coast {part two}, a day trip to Ravello.
May 15, 2017
Part two of our Amalfi Coast adventure.. this post includes I think my very favourite day of the whole trip. Ravello <3.
So carrying on where we left off {you can see part one here}. Wednesday morning started cloudy again...
Even the buses are Fiat in Italy!
... so we decided to save the beach until the afternoon again when it would burn off and go and walk the famous Path of the Gods trail. It's an ancient path right up in the mountains that goes from Bomerano to Nocelle. It's said that you get better views walking it this way {back to Positano}. You need to get a bus to Amalfi and then get one to Bomerano where the path starts. But we didn't want to be messing around with all the bus journeys so decided to take the shorter start route to Praiano the next town along and then climb up about 1500 steps to the start. It was SO steep and we wondered what the hell we were doing at some parts as we got higher and higher. Only to get to the very top where the path started to find that it was too foggy! Some others up there said it would be dangerous but also it defeated the object of doing it for good views when you'd be surrounded by clouds. Travel fail.. so down we walked the whole way down again and decided to walk back to Positano along the coast road. By this point the cloud down by the coast had cleared so we had amazing views on the walk back.
{top is a couple of seasons' old, shorts are online here}
These roads!
We found an incredible fruit stall on the way back one of the corners of the cliffs and stopped to pick up some juicy strawberries.
Alll the lemons.
Also we spotted my favourite Fiat of the whole trip. The colour of lemons and overlooking Positano.
By the time we'd got back the sun had come out, hooray!
Back in Positano we grabbed lunch from our favourite deli and headed to the beach for the afternoon. We'd done quite enough walking for that day!
Alla Spiaggia.. to the beach!
Dress online here. Bag from Mango but I can't find online now?
We booked Bruno's for dinner, again another recommendation. It was a restaurant that we kept walking past and the food had always looked really yummy. The tables are on the road but the view from here looking across the whole of Positano takes some beating.
People always ask me on Instagram who takes all of the photos of us together. In Positano literally everyone had a camera in their hand/around their neck! Everybody we met, a lot of Australians and Americans, were v friendly and taking photos so often people asked me to take one of them and then I asked them to reciprocate, or the other way round. Sometimes we use a tripod though although we didn't take one on this trip.
This guy, those pink shorts and these streets.
Again the pasta was insanely delicious. Homemade {you can definitely tell compared to the standard stuff} with prawns and olives. It was without exaggeration the best pasta I have ever eaten. {we went back here on our last night just to eat it all over again}.
Washed down with a gelato! I discovered my love for pistachio gelato on this trip, it's my new favourite flavour. One thing I would say about the food compared to other parts of Italy is that the pasta and pizza is definitely some of the very best {pizza was first made in Naples just along the coast} and even the delis for lunch were just out of this world for a simple sandwich or pasta salad. But gelato wise it's definitely not as amazing as further up in Rome and Tuscany where it was created. There's not as many geleterias and the flavours definitely aren't as adventurous or the best you'll ever have. But still gelato is gelato and we had one every single day without fail.
Pretty pink skies.
One of my favourite days of the whole trip was taking a boat down the coast to Amalfi. There are ferries from Positano to Amalfi, Salerno, Sorrento and Capri. We booked tickets for the earliest departure to Amalfi so that we could have a day there and up in Ravello.
We bought our tickets, it cost 7 euros each way for the half an hour trip down the coast. And it was such a great way to travel, I'd definitely rather be on a boat than be on a hot bus winding around the cliffs.
Also the best views of Positano, I think, are from the water. You can then really appreciate the way in which it's built completely into the cliffs.
The clouds made it even more dramatic looking.
It was cloudy when we arrived in Amalfi so we used this time to wander around the town. We wanted to make sure it was sunny when we'd arrive in Ravello as the gardens we'd planned on visiting look best with blue skies.
Amalfi is very touristy. The coastal part is beautiful and the duomo cathedral is very impressive but the rest of the town isn't anything special in my mind. I looked back at the photos I took whilst we were there and they were mainly just of an amazing market stall we found. I seem to take a lot of photos of similar things when I like them. Peaches and courgette flowers are no exception.
We didn't know if there would be many restaurants up in Ravello so we stopped in a little deli to pick up some sandwiches {aubergine, mozzarella and pesto!} to take for a picnic lunch.
We bought bus tickets to Ravello {from the tabbachi shop} and took the winding journey up the mountain.
Everybody had spoken magical things about Ravello so we were excited to see the old city.
It was beautiful. Full of old walls, churches, gardens and romantic luxury hotels. Being up away from the coast made it a lot quieter too. Lots of people get married/honeymoon in Ravello, I imagine it feels very special and private. It felt a bit like Tuscany up in the hills.
We explored the town before lunch, we'd mainly come to visit Villa Cimbrone and Villa Rufolo but it was amazing just wandering around the town itself. Especially when you come across two {!} fiats and old cream Vespas. So very Italian.
We had lunch in the main square and as if by magic the sun came out! We bought our tickets for the gardens for Villa Rufolo and went in search of the famous views.
The cascading gardens date back to the thirteenth century.
The gardens and planting were beautiful but that famous view of the Belvedere really captivated us. It's been on the front of so many guidebooks for the Amalfi Coast so it was amazing to actually be inside the photo.
This photo looks posed but you can see from my left arm that I was actually just rebalancing my hat rather than trying to look all blogger looking out to sea.. I promise!
You can see for miles down the coast across to the seaside towns below, the water so sparkly in the sun.
Pink and white is my favourite planting combination.
I think you all know how much I love a tiled floor. And the villa had rooms upon rooms of different tiles. All hand painted and incredibly intricate.
Alll the feet photos.
But look how pretty!
We sat in the square to share a sorbet after the first set of gardens to cool down, it was getting really hot now the sun had come out. Before wandering the other way through town to find Villa Cimbrone.
There are pretty tiled signs through Ravello pointing you towards Villa Cimbrone.
And you'll know that you're nearly there when you see old walls covered in roses.
Even the entrance to the gardens was swoon worthy. It reminded me of England on a summer's day, somewhere like Oxford or Cambridge, all ivy clad and beautiful stonework.
We got our tickets at the gates and then headed on down through the Wisteria lined walkway {hello wisteria hysteria!}
Like Villa Ruffolo, the gardens were beautiful and filled with roses, hydrangeas and shrubs. But the real highlight were the panoramic views. People say that the view from the infinity terrace is the best across the whole of the Mediterranean.
We were so lucky the sky was so blue by the time we visited. You really want a clear day to visit to maximise the views.
Definitely an afternoon to remember forever,
Instead of waiting to take a crowded bus back down to Amalfi I'd read about an ancient set of steps that takes you down from Ravello to Atrini and then round to Amalfi. It took about an hour, and was incredibly steep but so stunningly beautiful the whole way down.
It took us through olive and lemon groves on the hills, past sweet little houses and all the while with a view out to the coast that got bluer and bluer the whole way down.
Looking out through the olive and fig trees.
Pretty clifftop paths.
Alll the lemons.
As we got nearer to the coast we had amazing views down to hidden bays with turquoise water. This was just along from Atrini and would be worth exploring by boat or with the steps down from the coastal road.
Eventually, with sore knees and ankles from the steep climb down, we made it to the beach!
We didn't stay there for long, we weren't really dressed for it and there was a famous gelato shop in Amalfi calling our names...
You can either take an old path that links Atrini to Amalfi behind all the houses, or do as we did - just walk along the coastal road. You get amazing views from here.
I loved this view walking back into Amalfi.
Forever papping this guy. Sorry Ben <3.
After all that walking we'd sure earned a gelato. I googled the best gelato on the Amalfi Coast and this parlour kept coming up, Pasticceria Savoia right on the front of Amalfi. Nutella and coconut yummmm.
We sat in the main square by the port eating it before finding the next boat back to Positano.
Also a Fiat 600! I need to google these compared to the 500 range.
The view from the boat back was even better in the sunshine.
Ciao Amalfi, back to Positano we go...
Back with Part Three very soon, the third and final part of this Amalfi Coast Travelogue. Thanks for reading!
R <3 xx
3 comments
Ahhh this part of Italy has been on my wish list for so long. We have a little one on the way now, you're definitely doing the right thing packing in the trips like this in beforehand, I think the only way this would be on the cards for us in the next few years is as a 5 day getaway without the little one! Xx
ReplyDeleteAmazing Pictures, extraordinary view and thrilling location. I love to travel and explore different photographic locations. By going through your pictures I have become the fan of the place and will surely visit these coastal areas.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete