Tour of the Amalfi Coast (finally)

The Amalfi coast of southern Italy should certainly be on every traveler's European agenda. It is stunning! Our plan was to visit the towns that hug this beautiful coastline by riding local transportation. We had already used the local bus to get to our village, and we knew that another bus continued south along the coast and stopped at the idyllic towns we wanted to see. We had tried to use this cheap method the day before, but found that all the buses are already full and don't even stop at our little village. We can report that touring on the cheap using public transportation on the Amalfi coast just isn't possible during the busy summer travel season. So Brian and Alexia found a driver with a vehicle that could seat eight, and we had our private tour.

Our driver picked us up at our apartment, and we headed south along the rode that hugs this rocky coast line. Ancient arches still hang over the rocky edges, carrying cars and white-knuckle drivers that must meet oncoming traffic on hairpin curves and blind curves.

We snapped pictures as our driver explained that this was called the "Mama Mia! Highway." That's what we were yelling as we met cars on one-lane sections of this road.

When we started the drive, we were in the mountains high above the sea. The tiny dots in the water far below were yachts anchored at one of the little towns that make this coastline famous.

One of those towns is Positano, and we got our first look of her as we took this Mama Mia! highway down off the mountain.

There is a one-lane road that runs through Positano, and it is crazy narrow. We can't even imagine how these cars managed to get parked into these little parking places. Parking is at a premium, and we were lucky to have a driver that could drop us off, find a secret parking place off the road, and then pick us up later.

As we were driven down this narrow road, we were close enough to pick up an apple at the road-side grocery store, or snatch a french fry off a plate from a road-side cafe.

Our driver dropped us off at the top of Positano, with instructions to be back in an hour. We used our hour to soak in the views of the shore line below us.

The buildings look like they were glued to the side of the mountain as they tumbled down that steep slope that leads to the sea.

We could have used our hour eating breakfast, but we wanted to explore instead. Mark took a group picture before we headed down the street.

Now we know how those pedestrians felt when we drove by them so closely. Have we mentioned that the streets of Positano are so narrow!

As we continued down the steep street, we stopped in at some of the shops. This one featured everything you could imagine made from, or printed with, lemons.

It was nice to get off the road and continue down into the pedestrian zone of Positano. Now that we were no longer dodging cars, we could concentrate on the beauty of this coastal town.

We stopped to watch a photographer team lugging garment bags, tripods, and screens down those steps. They were taking pictures of models in front of old Positano relics.

After they finished, we took some pictures of some old American relics in the same spot.

We had beautiful blue-sky weather for a trip along the Amalfi Coast. It was a nice background to the Positano church.

Even though we got to town before 10:00 in the morning, it was already getting crowded. It was hard to take pictures without lots of other tourists in them.

We were already pushing our one-hour deadline, but we really wanted to make it all the way down the mountain to see the Positano beach.

It really was a lovely view from the sand to look up the mountain at the balcony views.

One last picture, before we had to race up all those steps to get back to our car. We traded out eating sidewalk cafe breakfast for a pastry on the run, but it was worth it for a quick tour of Positano.

Then we were back on that narrow winding road to see Positano in the rear view mirror.

Our driver knew the best (and perhaps only) place to pull off this Mama Mia! highway to get a view of the shore line of Positano. The little boats in the distance are the yachts of some of the world's rich and famous that like to hang out here.

We scored a group photo with all eight of us on the Amalfi coast.

What a great day on the Amalfi coast!

This pull-out is only big enough for a few cars, and one of those spots was taken by a fruit vender with a lovely assortment of local produce.

We continued down the Mama Mia! highway, snapping pictures out the van window.

This highway is an engineering marvel, hanging on to the edge of the mountains just like those houses. An occasional tunnel was drilled for traffic, but only wide enough for a single lane of cars.

So we had to pause and wait for our turn to proceed in the one-lane sections.

This was our last day in this area, and we were so blessed to be able to spend this day wandering God's wonders along the Amalfi coast!

Remember that these pictures were just snapped from a cell phone through the window of a moving van. Just imagine how spectacular they could have been with a proper camera and a tripod! We had thought about doing the "Path of the Gods" hike that follows this coast line. It's an epic hike that takes hikers along this coast for several hours of the best scenery in the world. But when we found out how complicated it was to get transportation on the Amalfi Coast, we thought that this van ride was perfect instead.

Our second town of the day was the name-sake town of this region. Welcome to the city of Amalfi.

One of the iconic places was the Amalfi Cathedral right on the public square. It was around noon when we arrived, and the crowds of tourists were out in force.

It was tough to get a cathedral picture without too many extra people in it.

Just like Positano, the streets of Amalfi were narrow.

They were made to feel even more narrow with the passing traffic. We learned to hug the walls or duck into a shop with each passing vehicle.

Denisa tried to take a picture of this truck full of lemons, but it was so close she could only picture the cargo--not the truck. It makes you wonder how many tourists get run over by lemon trucks while on vacation.

One of the tourist shops along this narrow road was making sandals by special order. Choose your sole and straps, and they put them together right before your eyes.

We had a two-hour stop in Amalfi, so we spent part of the time eating lunch. We had pizza served in the wine cellar of an old monastery. Pizza in Italy doesn't look much like Domino's Pizza in the United States. This was loaded with fresh tomatoes, fresh mozzarella pearls, and uncooked prosciutto. We've found that they use little to no sauce on pizza here in Italy.

We also stopped for gelato (again). It was obvious that Cooper's favorite flavor was chocolate.

It was a beautiful blue-sky day at the beach in Amalfi. But every square inch of sand was covered with beach umbrellas from the adjoining resorts. We never did find a place to walk out to the water.

This round-about was the pick-up point with our driver, and we had only moments to get in because parking (even momentarily) would result in a fine. Just like in Positano, it looked impossible to park a vehicle in Amalfi. It was great to have a driver. We headed south along the coast with another coastal town in our rear view mirror.

But this time we left the coast and headed up the mountain. Our next stop was Ravello, the highest town overlooking the coast. After the hordes of tourists in the last two towns, it was wonderful to find peace and open walkways in Ravello.

This was a mountain top town instead of a beach town, even though we could still see the sea far below us. 

Ravello was filled with old trees and old buildings, and it was Mark and Denisa's favorite stop of the day.

The buildings were still hugging the side of the mountains, but at higher altitudes.

We could take pictures of the old city walls without fear of being struck by a passing car or being lost in a crowd of vacationers.

Denisa was shopping for a cross from each country we visited. This is our favorite souvenir, and we have had this shopping tradition since we started traveling internationally. We're sad to say that many of our crosses were lost when Denisa's mother's house burned down a couple years ago. So we were looking for a replacement Italian cross. We shopped the local ceramic factory, but didn't find any crosses.

While shopping the quiet streets of Ravello, we had yet another gelato. If you count the lemon ice from the truck at the city gates, this would be the fourth frozen treat of the day.

As we looked over the mountains around us, we could see orchards, vineyards, and houses stacked on the steep slopes.

We enjoyed the beautiful skies, the beautiful flowers, and our beautiful niece was happy to be in our pictures. What a fun place!

Remember the crowds on the steps of the church in Amalfi? We were the only ones taking pictures at the church in Ravello today.

Earlier today we walked to the bottom of Positano and then had to race back UP to the car. Now we climbed to the top of Ravello, then had to race back DOWN to the car. It was good to get all that exercise, because we were heading down the mountain for a long drive back to the train station in Naples.

We didn't drive back on the slow Mama Mia! highway on the coast. Instead, we went over the mountains and then inland to make a loop. Taking the inland route was faster, but still came with the winding, narrow roads. When we met a bus coming around a curve, we had no choice but to back up. You can see that huge bus through the windshield of our van in the picture below. Our very cautious driver thought the truck behind us was also backing up, but we heard the crunch as our bumper hit his fender. We were just a little delayed as they determined it was both of their faults and the bus still needed to get by. Again, we were so glad that we hadn't rented cars to drive ourselves!

It was a grand tour of the Amalfi Coast, and we were blessed to have (finally) wandered God's wonders there on our last day in this beautiful part of the world. Our driver explained that September or October might be a better time to visit without the crowds of summer. But we had a peak day during the peak of the tourist season in spite of being here when everyone wanted to visit as well.