Places to Go (Vacation) - Hiking Italy's Amalfi Coast, Part 4 - Positano, Le Tore, Sorrento, and Pompeii

Final post on Italy . . .

On our 4th day, I was tired. Hiking is hard. And the hike lined up for day 4 was our hardest yet, so we decided to take the morning off - explore Positano, then take the bus to a half-way point and hike the rest of the way to our next destination. This didn't quite work out for us.

Up until this point, we had avoided the bus system by hiking from town to town. I'm not a huge bus fan, claustrophobia coupled with lack of control make me extremely uncomfortable. And the Amalfi Coast bus system didn't help to ease my nerves, due to the vehicle's height you can't see the road's guardrails, so it feels as if you're about to plummet into the ocean on a high windy road. As I tried to avoid vomiting, Dan fell asleep next to me (apparently the bus ride affects everyone in a different way). Thus, we missed our stop. One incredibly expensive and frightening cab ride later, we finally arrived at our destination - Agriturismo Le Tore, a working farm/B&B where we spent the night.



After a wonderful meal at the farm, where we dined with a lovely couple from Barcelona, we poured some wine and wandered around the property. The night was crazy dark, so we couldn't see much, other than what felt like a zillion fireflies flickering in between all of the crops. And stars. So so many stars.



Our final hike, on day 5, from Le Tore to Sorrento, was pretty easy and mostly took us through smaller towns, so we lingered, stopping for beers along the way.



Eventually we made it to our final destination, Sorrento and the absolutely gorgeous Hotel Tramontano. Sorrento was much larger than the other towns we'd visited, more along the lines of a "real city." We watched the most incredibly sunset at the hotel's balcony/bar (I still couldn't find a decent margarita).



We spent our last day in Italy at Pompeii, which was HUGE and a little overwhelming. So much to see. We rented audio tours but I kept losing my sense of direction and in retrospect we probably should have gone with an in-person guide. Oh well, the whole thing was both fascinating and depressing, especially with Mount Vesuvius looming in the background.



On our final night in Italy, Dan was picked from the crowd to twirl a street performer's jump rope, which seemed like a fitting end to a fantastic vacation.

The next day, we spent 22 hours traveling home: Sorrento - Naples (cab at 4 am); Naples - Munich (6:30 am flight); Munich - London; and London - Dulles; then cab to Arlington (this is the sort of itinerary you end up with when you book using discounted frequent flyer miles).

Now I keep obsessively checking out the On Foot Holidays website and trying to plan our next trip - maybe France? Or Tuscany? - which Dan keeps saying won't happen for several years. On the upside, the years keep flying by.

Happy Monday everyone!!