Atrani From The Sea

By Josef Rebell (1787-1828).  Born in Vienna, from 1811 to 1815 Rebell was the Court painter for Joachim Murat, King of Naples and Napoleon's brother in law.  Rebell's time as court painter ended when Murat was overthrown and executed after Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo.

Atrani is a small town on the Amalfi Coast, just east of the town of Amalfi.  The painting shows Atrani when it was a poor town clinging to the cliff side.  Later in the 19th century, the Amalfi Coast Drive was built along the coast, starting the area's path toward being a destination tourist spot.  This is what modern Atrani looks like.  On the cliff above Atrani is the beautiful town of Ravello, perched 1,000 feet above the sea, about which I've written before.

A Walk In Ravello

If you are looking for a way to imagine yourself outside the Covid penalty box and lower your blood pressure at the same time, watch this real-time video of a walk in Ravello.  Located on Italy's Amalfi Coast on a thousand foot high plateau looming over the coast it is a dramatic, beautiful and peaceful location.  The Mrs and I were supposed to be there right now before Mr Covid thought otherwise.  We've walked all these paths before and had looked forward to returning for our 4th visit.  Now we hope to make it there in 2022.  The hotel we stay in is located about 150 yards beyond the end of the tunnel shown in the last minute of the video.  Don't miss the view from the Belvedere of Infinity at the Villa Cimbrone which begins about 42 minutes in.

Villa Cimbrone

One of our favorite spots in the world, beautiful and peaceful, particularly if you can avoid the height of tourist season and visit in during the morning.  The views, the gardens, and the joy of just sitting quietly.  The entire town of Ravello is worth a couple of days visit.

We had planned to return this fall.  Hope to make it next year.

Atrani

The small town of Atrani is wedged in between the sea and the cliffs along the Amalfi Coast of Italy, just east of the town of Amalfi.  We've visited the area three times.  The road carried on the viaduct and around the building on the right is the Amalfi Coast Drive, the only road that goes from start to finish on the coast.  It's barely wide enough for two small cars to pass each other.  To be helpful, they've put mirrors on the corners (you can see one in the picture) as you drive around that big building so you can try to see what's coming at you.  Photo is from Conde Nast Traveler.

Living Large In 50 AD

At this link you can find an interesting report from Italian TV on the recent discovery of a large first century Roman villa in the center of the seaside Amalfi Coast resort of Positano which THC has visited several times (see related posts).  The remains of the villa were found during excavations under existing structures and, as you can see in the linked video, the degree of preservation of the interior room paintings is remarkable.

The video report is in Italian but from other sources it appears that the villa was built in either the first century BC or early first century AD.  It was likely abandoned after the massive eruption of Mt Vesuvius in 79AD which destroyed the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum (see related post) possibly because ash fall from the volcano made the villa uninhabitable for its wealthy owner.  Nothing like this had previously been found in the Positano area and it is a further reminder that in recent decades archaeologists have discovered evidence that the Roman Empire, from Britain to Turkey, was much more densely populated than previously estimated.

A Little Bit Of Italy

On Monday THC was at his dentist's office and things were running late so he was browsing through the magazines.  Imagine his surprise when he pulled out the April 2014 issue of Travel and Leisure Magazine from beneath a rusting pile of periodicals and on the cover was a picture of his favorite place in Italy about which he's written before.  The article was on restaurants with a view and the one featured on the cover was il Pirata located in the Marina Di Prai area of Praiano along Italy's Amalfi Coast.  This picture shows part of the restaurant and above it on the headland the 10th century Saracen tower built to warn the locals about sea-raiders from Sicily and North Africa.

Not pictured but less than 50 feet to the right and up the hill about 25 feet is the Hotel Onda Verde where we've stayed three times in recent years.  Here's a link to the restaurant which features some more pictures of the location.  And yes, it is a nice as it looks.

          Here's the view from the marina area back towards Il Pirata and just above and to the right, the Hotel Onda Verde.

Italian Passageways II

And now on to Capri.  Capri does not have cars and there is only one road used for buses and taxis so the paths and passageways are even more important than on the Amalfi Coast.

The center of the town can get a little crowded.  This is one of the two routes from our hotel to the central plaza.

Our favorite restaurant, Da Tonino, is about a 20 minute walk out into the "country".  This is some of the route:

The paths wander all around the island.  Note the lamp poles which makes for easy walking in the evening.

And if you want a quieter area just head over to Anacapri, the other town on the island.

If you don't want to take the taxi or the bus you can always walk the path from Anacapri back to Capri!

Italian Passageways I

From our spring trip to the Amalfi Coast and Capri.  These passageways are not neglected by-ways.  They are major thoroughfares for the towns we visited.  Why?  Well, this is Positano.

They apparently thought it was a good idea to build on cliffsides and narrow ledges, jamming all the buildings together and leaving little room for foot traffic.  That's why.

From Ravello.  If you'd like to walk from the town down to the coast this is the path:

Walking through the main part of town:

Down at the coast in Praiano the paths are still narrow.

Even to get to our room at the Onda Verde we had to go through a passageway internal to the hotel that was cut through the cliff side.

And back to Positano where we started:

Marina Di Praia

We recently returned to one of our favorite spots in Italy, the Hotel Onda Verde in Praiano.   The hotel is actually in a section of the town known as Marina Di Praia where a beach is wedged in between two cliffs rising a few hundred feet and it's where the local fisherman bring their catch to the local restaurants.

We enjoy walking around the area and having dinner at the restaurants in the Marina.  This is a little tour and the first picture below is from the Onda Verde's website which is worth a look.  Most of what you see if the hotel but it is also intermingled with private residences.  At the very top (right-center) is the road and garage from which you take an elevator down to get to the six levels of the hotel.

On the headland (upper center-left) is a "Saracen tower" built in the 9th or 10th century at a time when Moorish ships from North Africa and Sicily regularly raided the coast for goods and slaves.  A network of these towers was built along the Amalfi Coast during these centuries to provide warnings of attacks and less than 15 miles down the coast raiders occupied the village of Cetara for about twenty years.  The last raids in this area of Italy didn't occur until the 18th century.


  To get to the Marina we walk down the path from our hotel (left) and around the corner.







Looking back at the Onda Verde.


And this is what it looks like once you are within the cliffs.

You can see the Amalfi Coast road about halfway up the cliff along with one of the many tunnels on the road.

Our favorite restaurant in the Marina is Amandino's and this is Amandino (standing in the center).  If you have dinner there you'll have whatever was caught that day.


Little did I know (and only learned several days later in Capri) that the shirt I was wearing which is from the Botofogo Soccer Club in Rio de Janeiro (courtesy of avid THC reader AP) also happens to be the same shirt worn by the Juventus Soccer Club in Italy.  Unfortunately, Juventus is from the North of Italy and detested in the South and while we were there Juventus defeated Naples in the championships.  I had to stop wearing the shirt.

Capri

The Villa Of Tiberius covered one of the attractions of Capri.  We'll look around a bit more on the island in this post.

We're having lunch west of Sorrento on the mainland.  This view is from the restaurant looking west towards Capri.  The Villa of Tiberius is on the tall spur on the left side of the island.

There's only one landing place on the island, Marina Grande. This photo of the harbor (by Wade48 on flickr) is taken from Anacapri and on the far side of the harbor is the headland on which the Villa of Tiberius is located.

To get to the town of Capri you have to take a funicular railway up the hill. Photo below from Google Images:
When you get off of the funicular you'll be in the crowded town square which is our least favorite part of the island.  Photo from Google Images:
Once you're out of the immediate vicinity of the square things calm down and you are walking on the pathways that thread over the island.  (Photo from Google Images.This is the hotel we stayed at:

From our balcony.

A park.

You need to be in shape to walk some of the paths.

International man of intrigue.