Day Trips to Amalfi and Capri

Hi, its Jen here to fill you in on some fun adventures we had around Sorrento. When in and around Sorrento, it totally makes sense to visit the beautiful hill town of Amalfi and the Isle of Capri, right?

Kind of.

The true answer depends on a few things, like your ability to plan ahead (ours is mediocre), your tolerance for crowds (we have expanded our crowd tolerance by visiting Italy in August), your tolerance for expense (ours varies but I personally tend toward the thrifty side of life) and how motion sick you get (not much, but read on for insight).

AMALFI

We set out, walking the 5 minute walk from our hotel in Piano di Sorrento (NOT Sorrento proper due to us being booked out of the city thanks to poor communication between Chris and I at the height of tourist season) to the Circumvesuviana station. It is a short ride on the train, but....that train is the Circumvesuviana, which I do not like. It is certainly not the worst train in the world but after riding through Italy quickly, comfortably and easily on Trenitalia trains, including Frecciarossas, being dependent upon the Cirucumvesuviana was sort of a let down. However, it got us where we wanted to go, albeit slowly, and often leaving us hot, cranky and sweaty. I guess it is like if the PATH had no air conditioning and people were encouraged to spray paint all over the cars. I know, I know. Naples is gritty and that is part of its charm. I am just a soft American.

Blech

Otis has a higher tolerance for hot, crowded rides 

Our plan was to pick up bus to Amalfi from Sorrento; we bought our tickets at the train station - about €15 for all of us. We grabbed an early lunch first at Mondo Bio, a small organic grocery with a veg restaurant attached. I enjoyed my tofu dish especially because it was the first non pizza/pasta meal I'd had in a while (not complaining!). We all had a good time having a good meal. Fueled up, we sauntered over the short way to the train station/bus pickup area. Guess how many other people wanted to go to Amalfi? A lot. So many that we couldn't fit on the bus! The next bus was in a half hour, so we waited in the sun and boarded 30 min later. Despite our assertive tourist ways, even on that bus, our only available seats were in the back but at least we were sitting -- this bus too was super crowded and standing the entire journey seemed an unpleasant option.

We hit the road and drove through Sorrento and began our ascent to our first stop- Positano, a very pretty town nestled into the cliffs high above the Mediterranean. The ride became more and more beautiful while at the same time Chris and I looked at each other with wider and wider eyes as the bus made its way up, beeping its horn around curves and I'm sure taking many other precautions unseen from the rear of the vehicle. The joy is in the journey, right?

You probably know the deal with this road. It is twisty and narrow and not really built for the volume of traffic that now travels through. It is also perched on the edge of cliffs in a way that seems dangerous but seems to work for everyone. Overwhelmingly, though, it is just beautiful and affords stunning views. We oohed and ahhhed all the way and alighted in Amalfi town proper. It was a beautiful sunny day and we walked through town, ordered gelato and made our way to the beach. It was delightful! We swam, sunned (as much as one does with long pants, sunscreen and multiple umbrellas angled just right), read, rested and as the sun sank, we headed back to the bus boarding area. Unsurprisingly, it was crowded and the bus that was boarding when we got there left on its twisty uphill journey back toward Sorrento without us. Again, despite being in the front of the line, we ended up sitting in the back of the next bus. We need to up our aggressive bus boarding game. This time, Chris and I ended up getting really motion sick on the way back and when we got back into Sorrento we had headaches and a case of bad humor. Nonetheless, we rolled over to the burger joint in town where we all had veggie burgers and fries -- a nice treat!-- and found out that when you order broccoli on or with (we were not quite sure), they mean broccoli rabe. I mean broccoli is a strange topping, but so too is broccoli rabe. That will definitely clear up your motion sickness and attendant bad humor! And also I appeared to have ordered my first, and perhaps last, broccoli rabe and french fry veggie burger.

Gorgeous cathedral (aren't they all?)

As the sun faded so did our desire to be in a beach town many kilometers away from our hotel.

...but we had such a fun day in Amalfi

Silly faces do not ward off back of the bus motion sickness

One broccoli rabe and french fry burger coming up!

The excitement wasn't over yet! The cursed Circumvesuviana stops running strangely early considering Italians in general are night owls. So we took a bus back to our hotel, which was even more exciting because Piano di Sorrento was having a pizza festival and all of the roads were closed in town. Never fear -- eventually we made it home to our teeny tiny hotel room.

Piano di Sorrento: At Least Our Pizza Festival is Fun!

All you see is all we got

CAPRI

Not done with adventures, the next day we decided to re-board the Circumvesuviana and go back to Sorrento to catch a ferry to Capri. Since Capri is the most popular destination in basically the entire region, the ferry options were limited for the casual (read: underprepared) traveler. There was space on a ferry over but we'd be limited in return ferries; our only option was spending a few hours on the island before the return ferry back to Sorrento. NO PROBLEM! We are wacky adventurers who don't mind throwing down €85 for a few hours of a life enhancing experience! Lets go! Andiamo!

There are a zillion stairs walking down to the port in Sorrento. Do not attempt if you are not into walking a lot.

Plenty of seats on this ferry

Arriving in Capri

Plan A: visit the Blue Grotto. Only one of the main reasons I wanted to go to this region, you'd think I might have booked ahead. Nope. Our casual attitude toward grotto visits meant that we were booked out of this.

Plan B: go on the funicular to the main town and explore. Yeah! We walked through the town (not a time consuming proposition) and made our way on tiny narrow street/path/corridor/walkways toward Arco Naturale -- a natural stone arch that is a collapsed grotto at the edge of the sea. Unsurprisingly given how our day was going, l'arco was surrounded in scaffolding and getting a redo. However, the views were gorgeous!

We are hot but smiling! Thats how you know it was the beginning of the visit, not the end.

Beautiful blue water as glimpsed between reinforcement beams on scaffolding

We made our way down to the town, waited 35 long hot minutes with a million other people in line for the Funiculare (we probably should have walked it, but we didn't know the length of the wait time), silly us. 

ANNOYING/ANNOYED

Rocky beach, choppy surf...

...warm water

We had exactly 15 minutes on the beach at Capri and then oh, time to go stand in line to board our ferry? Fine. See ya Capri. Next time we will be more prepared for you, I take it as a personal challenge. 

We out