Positano – Days 4-6
I got very varied reactions when I told people I was
visiting Positano – especially when I added the detail that it was with a group
of five friends – all guys. Certainly, Positano is not a town that a group of
five twenty-somethings would oft choose to visit. It is a beautiful town in a
beautiful scape of Italia, right on the Amalfi Coast. It is a town for couples,
for romantics, and very clearly a town for the rich. But we came a week before
the rich will descend on its hills and coast. In a sense, we came a week before
Positano becomes Positano, which was just perfect for us.
It is clear just how bueatiful a city Positano is from the
moment you get there. The town is basically one long, winding road from up in
the hills down to the water and back up. We were at the beginning of that road,
near the top of the city. We would soon learn all the positives (the incredible
view) and negatives (the frightfully tiring steps down and especially up).
The best part of Positano was probably the view, which was
great during the day, better at dusk when the fading sky would envelop the
series of houses and hotels and shops below, and best at night when it lit up
like a Christmas Tree.
There’s not much to ‘do’ in Positano in a sense. There was
some good shopping – taking advantage of it still being ‘quiet’ season with
shop owners openly telling us they were one week away from increasing prices.
There is of course the water, which we went to each day and took a ferry up and
down to Amalfi (the town). Then there is that incredible scenery. It started
during our drive from Rome to Positano (with a stop in Pompeii) and lasted
throughout our time in Positano, seeing that great scenery, a wondrous mix of
Cape Town and the Pacific Northwest.
The natural beauty of Positano was best when we did the Path
of the Gods, a three hour trail (fairly flat with a few slight peaks and a more
stunning, scary, annoying, knee-ending valley at the end). The trail started in
Bomerano, which is about an hour from Positano and gave us our best chance to
see the wonder that is the Amalfi Coast. The trail itself gives so many photo
opportunities, so many moments to take it all in, and so many memories.
Like the other parts of the trip, the food was notably
excellent – if a bit expensive (to be fair, everything in the Amalfi Coast area
is expensive). The meals in Positano were all good. Our most memorable probably
was a dinner at La Tagliata, a true ‘family style’ place with all the dinners
receiving a series of large plates made by the family that runs the restaurant –
a true family business with the papa and mama as cooks, and brothers and
sisters as the wait-staff. The restaurant is situated high up on the cliffs so
the view is spectacular. La Tagliata was a true highlight, even if the amount
of food they gave us (almost all of it good) was overwhelming.
The other interesting meal in the town was a lunch at a
green-forward heavily veg eatery that seemed straight out of LA. I’m sure this
is a place that is heavily, heavily frequented by the rich and famous starting
the week after we came. Other meals in Positano were a mix of down-home
trattoria’s and trendy, touristy, seafood joints.
One night we did venture outside of Positano to Sorrento,
having to deal with the ridiculous taxi fares. Sorrento is a real city, with
places that stay open late all year long. Positano has a couple bars, and one
honest-to-goodness club (on the rocks no less) but all of those things opened literally
the weekend right after we left. Sorrento had bars that were open now, so we
went there one night.
For dinner before our night out, we went to Pepe Bianco, a surreally
white décor restaurant with really good, trendy food – all the nice plating and
taste, without the high Rome (or Positano) prices. After dinner, we walked
through the town which reminded me a lot of places I went to in Provence on a
work trip early last year. The place we went to was a beer bar, with the owner/bartender
serving a range of personally selected European beers. Italy’s beer scene is
mostly rubbish, but they have the smarts to pour mostly non-Italian fare at
places like this.
My time in Positano was interesting. In a sense, it loved up
to my expectations of it. The sight of the city collapsing towards the beach
way below, with picture-perfect Italian houses and buildings dotting the cliff,
was every bit as beautiful as I had hoped. I was never not amazed and agape at
that view.
The town is quiet, but there is beauty in that quietness. In both
Rome (and Sicily after that) some of our favorite times were sharing a beer
among many other Italians doing a night on the town. In Positano, that image
was just replaced with us sharing a bottle of wine a rooftop with our heads
looking upwards at the natural beauty of the place. I guess that is what
Positano is great for after all.
