Southern Italy - Europe 2003

Week 3

As we enter our third week, we leave Sicily and drive up to the Amalfi Coast. Getting into Amalfi is always a draining experience. The coast highway is very narrow and at many of the curves, if a bus appears, traffic must stop and sometimes cars back up to make room.
We stayed at La Bussola Hotel with rooms overlooking the water. It was great to be right in the town area. Just minutes away from the best ice cream in Italy. We list this as a Great Place To Stay based on the hotel, its staff and a great location.	La Bussola on the water just a few steps from the main square of Amalfi.	Great roof-top area at the hotel to sun and order drinks!
We will use our stay here to visit Ravello, enjoy the scenery and even make a trip into Naples.	The view from the room. Incredible.	Streets are a joy to walk in Amalfi.
Amafli, like the other towns along the Coast, is a verticle wonder. The town just seems to hang from the cliffs. Chris and Carmen found a natural lounge chair in the rocks to enjoy life.	Amalfi, hanging onto the coastline.	Chris and Carmen, I think they will be back here again!

	So Glenn and Karen have had a few trips to the Amalfi Coast, and this was the second trip for Chris & Carmen. The thought of driving into Naples has always been one that has never been too hotly persued. But this year we decided to take a boat from Amalfi to Naples, enjoy the day, and then travel back by train. It was a great idea.
	We recommend using the very efficient boat service to do any travelling along the Amalfi Coast. Why take you care onto the road for yet one more impossible drive? The boats are frequent and do not cost that much.
It was only 9€ per person for a hyrdrofoil boat trip that made it in about 2 hours 30 minutes. (It was the stops at Sorrento and another port of call that adds the time.) We arrive in the town, walk to the Galleria Umberto II and agree to meet back at 5:00 pm. We are then off our seperate ways to explore the city.	Looking over Naples the city is a rainbow of subtle colours.	The impressive Galleria
Chris and Carmen wanted to see the Museo Archeologico Nazionale, which is very impressive and ranks as one of the key museums in Italy. Our timing was right. It is closed on Tuesdays but stays open from 9:00 am to 10 pm.
Karen and Glenn wanted to just walk the streets. There are plenty of those as Naples is all about crowded narrow streets with a everything imaginable thing being sold by someone. Hair dye from an over-turned umbrella! The streets of Naples are truly the living rooms of the people of Naples.	Narrow streets of Naples
Naples has a church almost at every block. They are known for their extensive interior decorations. We had read the tour books and looked forward to seeing the insides of a number of the impressive churches. Unfortunately, almost all were closed and this was not only due to the time of day. But that just left more time to walking the streets and manoeuvring among people, cars and motor bikes.	Impressive churches	Good family transportation
		Lovers in Naples.

	Montecassion is one of the most famous monasteries in Italy. It is located high on a mountaintop over the Garigliano valley. Again timing is everything on a trip to Italy. We arrived just after 10:30 and it has hours so the Abbey closes at 12:30.
The Montestary has been destroyed by fire no fewer than five times... but considering we are talking about since 529 there was plenty of time to rebuild. Much was destroyed in 1944 when the Germans bombed the buildings. The pictures of the bombing were starting. Such a waste.
There is no feeling of poverty in this Abbey and if you visit be sure to take in the museum. It is very well done with everything from jewelry to clothing to religious artifacts. You will certainly come away with the feeling of the great wealth that had been accumulated over the years.

	If there is one name that gets us all laughing it is Gaeta. It was the desire to visit Gaeta that started the talk about going to Southern Italy in 2003. Carmen saw it the town featured on a TV cooking show. After a couple of planning dinner parties it was settled. We were going to Gaeta and the literary would work around that.
We had arrived at noon, so we only had lunch and then headed to the town of Sperlonga, which is 15 km down the road. We could not find suitable accomodations in Gaeta. The lunch was great. We all had some of the best pasta dishes of the trip. The decor was alittle strange but, we are after the food.
We booked into Sperlonga and then on the following afternoon went back to explore Gaeta. Again, we arrived, split up and agreed to meet back at a specified time. Within a very short time we all had come to conlusion that it was great to view from afar, but that Sperlonga was a much more interesting and enjoyable location.	Some of the great old structures, all in various states of decay.	Impressive catherdral in Gaeta.
We all shook our heads at the though of the military taking over the impressive castle and using it as their administrative centre not open to the public. Luckily we all found ourselves returning to our meeting place early. We packed it in and headed back to Sperlonga for what turned out to be a very good dinner.

Now this was the town that was a big surprise. We only ended there because we travelled to Gaeta. A small town on the cliffs over the water. White-washed. Narrow streets take you through a maze of medieval buildings.
Sperlonga was one of the memorable towns of the visit. Scenes at every corner. Oh yes. Chris completed quite a taste test of what has to be one of the largest gelatos. We ate at: Gli Archi via Ottaviano 17 centro storico Sperlonga We had a great meal, the restaurant serves good food in a classic decor.	The place has to "look".	Yes he did eat the whole thing.
Our table at the Gli Archi.	Italians have "cool" down to an art!	Sperlunga has the best beach north of Naples and South of Rome.

Rome is a city we can never visit enough. Now that we have visited the top attactions we can visit Rome and really enjoy the city, its buildings, the colour and the feel.	Chris and Glenn enjoying drinks in Rome.	The colours of Rome.
For lunch we ate at: Ristorante Passetto via Zanarderlli, 14 (Just north of Piazza Navona).	No only did we have a great meal there, but according to the restaurant, so have politicians, and Queen Elizabeth, Charlie Chaplin, Arthur Rubistein, Prince Ranieri of Monaco and Grace Kelly, Salvador Dalì, Ava Gardner, Gary Cooper, Tyron Power, Clark Gable, Elizabeth Taylor.	Great outdoor tables at Passetto.
I wonder if they drank as much as we did. We had a blast and the food was very good.	Carmen and her men.	Oh the fountains.
In addition to the Vatican there are churches everywhere in Rome. They are all impressive and well worth a visit.
		Spanish Steps
In addition to normal impressive attractions. Chris has marked off key things to see from a Gourmet article on the 100+ Best Things About Rome. Yep, we found the famous tie shop and yes, it was a very expensive visit. It turned out the tie store, J. Valentini was just a few doors down from the Ristorante Passetto.	Trevi Fountain. How could you not go there.	Glenn and Antonio, ties were the thing by buy.

So that was our trip. Another great time in Italy. As we all made our own way to the airport - some going by cab and enjoying the trip, others driving a car through madness, we knew we would be back.		In the words of Arnold: "I'll be back..."

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