Bussing around the Sorrento Peninsula

 [27 February 2004]

We awoke at 8:20 am Friday morning to some sun but it was only a tease for much of today would be rain and clouds. Anyway, we had breakfast at 8:45 in the hotel (we were on the breakfast plan) and we head down to the central piazza along the waterfront to catch a bus to Sorrento. Our plan is to stop at Positano on the way back. 

The bus trip takes some 2 hours to go 28 km so you get an idea of how slow the road along the Sorrento Peninsula can be; the traffic in Sorrento was made up of one long gridlock, rather like NYC at rush hour. And this was February! We were trying to imagine what it must be like in June. Plus it was cold and raining. So we just got off the bus at the train station depot (the terminus in Sorrento) and back on another bus a half-hour later after having a coffee at a bar across the street. 

The bus to Positano was something I can live without ever doing again. Picture the car rally up Pike’s Peak in Colorado but with buses. Anyway, we get off the bus at the first of two stops in Positano – the bus doesn’t actually go down into the town but rather stays high up along the ridgeline. So we walk and walk and walk in the rain down to Positano. In fact we don’t even go all the way down since the shops are closed – many for the season. 

We stop and get our tickets to return to Amalfi and then begin the climb up the other side of the town to the bus stop (Fermata SITA). We get the bus about 4:40 pm and arrive back in Amalfi at about 5 pm. This leg was a bit more relaxed. We walk around Amalfi a bit and bought a local light red wine, “Tramonti” Costa d’Amalfi (Giuseppe Apiulla viticoltore) before heading back to the hotel to relax and get ready for dinner. 

Dinner was at 7:15 (they only serve 7-8:30 during the week) and started with spaghetti in a putanesca sauce: capers, anchovies, garlic and olives with tomatoes; another wonderful way to begin a meal. We both ordered poached red snapper, with sautéed broccoli and oven-browned potatoes. The wine is a bottle of 2002 “Vigna Cicogna” Greco di Tufo. Delicious!