With this typical Belgian summer, more Belgians feel like packing their bags and heading for the sun. Corona does not make travelling any easier with all those bright colours on the European travel map. Italy is still green and remains a top destination to go to: good weather, lovely charming towns, good food & wine: count us in! Those who feel like a bit of Dolce Vita last minute can quickly hop on a plane to Naples and do the lovely Amalfi Coast! We presented you with this trip in a condensed five-day package, which is sure to be a top experience!
Citta di Ciro
Touchdown is done after a good two hours on the plane at the airport of Naples. This rough southern city has everything to charm you at least for a city trip. The city where Diego Armando Maradona was canonised, but where our very own Dries Mertens also deserves a statue, is a city you shouldn’t miss. You hate it or you love it with Naples. Nice and rugged, unadulterated, a bit dirty but at the same time so authentic and popular! The city is easy to savour but unfortunately, due to our busy schedule, we did not have too much time for that. With a few hours to spare before heading for the Amalfi coast, we did a Napoli ‘espresso’. Via via, we ended up at the Dutch couple Iris & Joël of ‘OntdekNapels‘ (https://ontdeknapels.nl/). With them, we booked the blissful ‘Maradona Tour‘: you get to know Naples at its best via all kinds of alleys, extremely cosy bars and reliquaries.
Citta di Pizza
Even rugged and unadulterated as the city itself is the local food scene. Italians consider food to be the most important thing in life, and don’t blame them. Napoli is known as the cradle of pizza. Pizza e una cosa seria, because here you have to follow the strict rules of the art if you want to be considered a Neapolitan pizza chef. On our list was the über-famous pizzeria Sorbillo (https://nl.viamichelin.be/web/Restaurant-Zoeken/Napoli-80133-Gino_Sorbillo-12nycnjjt) which is even listed in Michelin. Unfortunately it was very crowded, which made us move to the next pizza hotspot: Mazz Bar Pizzeria, right across from the Sorbillo brothers. Here we had one of the most delicious pizzas ever. The Margherita showed why you can make a top product with simple ingredients. Now we fully understand why it was Queen Marghareta‘s favourite snack. Anyway, our trip was ‘destination Amalfi‘ and a few espressi later we were mixing our cheerful hire car along the impressive Amalfi coast. Seeing Naples and dying: not just yet please!
Amalfi littoral splendour
Between Naples and our destination, Sorrento, there are heaps and heaps of road. But the journey there is certainly an experience in itself. You get the instant summer feeling as you meander along the coastal road and pass one beautiful village after another. All this against the ever-present backdrop of Vesuvius. That the Vesuvius has played a very important role in history, we will find out later when we visit the ruins of Pompeï.
But anyway, Sorrento first. This charming town has everything that makes the Amalfi coast attractive: lovely strolling streets, picturesque squares, a beautiful view of the Bay of Naples, lots of nice restaurants and of course lemons in abundance! Limoncello, you know…
We stayed at the beautiful Grand Hotel Capodimonte (bit.ly/capodimontesorrento). The hotel is very centrally located and you can walk right into the main street of Sorrento. The hotel has that typical grandeur of an Italian Grand Hotel with beautiful local colouring (green and yellow). We enjoyed the beautiful landscaped swimming pools immensely. The beautiful view of the Bay of Naples is a free bonus. Even in corona times the waiters did their utmost to serve us.
Qualcosa da mangiare!
And you can’t eat so well in Sorrento! It was really ‘killing your darlings’ given our limited stay. Our absolute favourite was L’ Antica Trattoria (https://www.lanticatrattoria.com/). A classically dressed trattoria but oh so delicious. The products and dishes came out well here. An absolute must!
Finally, we also had a nice dinner at one of the Michelin Restaurants in the area: Terrazza Bosquet (https://www.exvitt.it/bosquet/en/ ). This was an okay experience but certainly not the best given the Michelin status. The food and the service are a step lower than what you may expect from a one star restaurant in Belgium.
Capri, starry-eyed beauty island
One of the absolute must do’s is a boat trip to Capri. Boats and prices come in all shapes and sizes, but we preferred a private boat in full corona time. The friendly skipper of ‘Restart boat’ (https://bit.ly/restartboat) ensured a day of fun on the water. No stop or joke was too much for him. During our day trip, we had plenty of time to discover the picturesque car-free island of Capri. With the electric version of De Lijn we were brought to the centre, at the very top of the island. Counting the number of Louis Vuittons strolling by, we soon realised that this was the island of the rich & famous. Seeing and being seen counts here as much as in the place m’as-tu-vu in Knokke! It should therefore come as no surprise that the world’s biggest luxury brands crowd here to compete with the shopping-minded ladies and gentlemen.
Toughly speaking, Capri has managed to retain its authenticity. At the local trattoria, we ate one of the most amazingpastas with seafood (https://www.losfiziocapri.com/). Just when we were in seventh heaven, we had to hurry to the boat to make the crossing to Sorrento again. To end the day, the skipper offered us a few more beautiful swimming spots with oversized luxury yachts for the rich of the world in the distance.
Amalfi, a citrus fresh view on the mediterranean
The town whose name was used to name the entire coastline was impossible to miss on our trip. Bathed in sunshine, this beautiful but small coastal town offers the opportunity for a delightful stopover. Stroll slowly through the lovely streets, settle down for an espresso on the central square overlooking the beautiful church of Amalfi and have a nice lunch in a top restaurant in the middle of a cherry garden. When you finish your meal with a delicious lemon sorbet, you’ll feel like you’re in seventh heaven.
Pompei, the best but also painful confrontation with antiquity.
For anyone interested in antiquity and wanting to find out more about what life was like in the Roman era: hurry to Pompeï! This city had 20,000 inhabitants around the year 0 and was wiped off the map in the year 79 by an unseen extinction of the volcano Vesuvius. Today you can visit a large part of this open-air museum and gain indelible impressions of what life must have been like then.
Please note: this is not for the sensitive souls as you can literally see and feel how life stood still on those days in 79 BC. We had to take a breath, when we saw replicas of the bodies of people, large and small, who had fled, suddenly buried under a relentless lava flow.
In addition to the human suffering, the site is of course top for its archaeological discoveries. Because the lava flow covered the city under a thick layer of ash, many houses and temples remained intact. More than 2000 years later, it is incredible to walk through a Roman villa or temple. Be sure to take the audio guide or virtual reality to soak up all the atmosphere of the past! Must do!
So, hopefully we’ve inspired you a bit with this trip report and maybe you’ll decide to book a trip to Amalfi last minute! Other great travel inspiration can be found in our section Puretravel! Alla prossima!