PositanoThe forecast was for sun in the morning, but rain in the afternoon, so climbing up Vesuvius was a non-starter. We could have gone to Herculaneum, but it’s a much smaller version of Pompeii, so we decided to go around the Amalfi coast. Amalfi is an hour and a half by bus, so we opted for Positano instead. The coast around the area is rugged mountains with few beaches. The road from Sorrento to Positano goes over a mountain and then along the coast next to a sheer drop, several hundred meters high, all the way. On the way up the mountain the bus driver would cut up other road users and then stop to spend time having loud arguments with lots of wild gesticulating. He would make up the lost time driving round the bends like a maniac. At particularly sharp bends he would hoot his horn to give oncoming cars the chance to choose between crashing into us head-on or driving themselves off the side of the cliff. It was like Alton Towers for the bargain price of 1.80 euros.

Positano is beautiful. Built on a very steep sided cove, it straddles its way up the mountain side. There is a small beach at the bottom. As we arrived the sun was shining, but on arriving at the beach it had clouded over. We spent the morning and lunch time there and then headed back to Sorrento. We walked down to the harbour at Sorrento when the heavens opened and we scuttled back to the hotel for more movies while the rain lashed the windows.

Once the rain had a break we went out for dinner. We chose a local (i.e. non-touristy) place where the owner enticed us with deep fried bread balls filled with cheese and rocket. The pizza was great and we ate about as much as we could. She over-charged us for the meal, but she had been so nice, we didn’t quibble. On getting back to the hotel I started to feel decidedly off. Stomach cramps, sore kidneys, waves of nausea and cold shivers later, I decided I probably had food poisioning. It was a long night.

See photos of today.

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