GO FEEDBACK: The Amalfi coast has all a keen walker could desire, from stunning vistas of the sea to lots of history – and seemingly bottomless wine bottles, writes KATE BATEMAN
‘HAVE A look at those clumpy shoes, backpacks and sticks,” a male tourist said to his female companion in the glorious sunshine of Positano one Friday afternoon in early June.
Little did he know the group had been walking since 10am. They had collected packed lunches from a café on the square in Bomerano, a village 600ft above sea level in the mountains between Sorrento and Amalfi, trekked 9km across diverse terrain, visited a perfect, miniature nature reserve, seen magnificent waterfalls, descended 1,500 steps and were now deciding whether to have an ice cream or a swim to cool their aching feet.
Their journey had taken them along the Path of the Gods, a walking track between the towns of Agerola, Praiano and Positano, that is well known thanks to the writings of such authors as Goethe, Italo Calvino and DH Lawrence.
The male tourist was right to be surprised at what he saw. The towns of Ravello, Positano and Amalfi have changed in recent years. Previously the residents, hotel guests and day-trippers to be seen on the streets were clad in chic shorts, cobwebby tops and shod in strappy sandals. Now the town’s narrow streets are full of walkers in beige or grey shorts taking care not to turn too sharply in case their backpacks connect with stands of ceramics.
It is easy to see the attraction. The beautiful countryside of the Agerola in the province of Naples in the Campania region has well-developed agri-tourism, a good bus service connecting a network of villages that have hotels happy to offer bed and board to individuals or groups. Independent travellers are equally at home here. The Exodus group I was with dined together at long tables, but the handsome restaurant had lots of tables for individuals too.
The food at the Hotel 2 Torri (hotelleduetorri.it) was delicious and the alcohol honour system was exceptional. At dinner there were flagons of excellent local white and red wines on the table. When the tally came around, you had to write the number of glasses you had imbibed beside your name – assuming you could remember.The first glass cost €2, a second was €5, but after that there was no extra charge for the group.
I wondered whether the hotel ever got burned because of the system. Perhaps the 10.30pm bedtime, the five- to six-hour walks, and the 7am wake-up calls were deterrents. Or perhaps honesty and moderation had more to do with the composition of the guests? All Exodus travellers but two were English and all were over 35.
Over pre-dinner drinks each evening we were briefed on the next day’s weather, the route and the terrain. We were told whether the ground would be rocky, slippery, wooded or open and, most importantly, the gradient. A choice of sandwich was recorded and sent on to the village café.
On the first day we commenced the Monte Sant’ Angelo walk from the hotel door after the owner had given a waterproof jacket to one of our group who did not have their own. After we had been climbing for an hour and half, the threatened weather struck; thunder and rain drove us downhill towards shelter. The rain stopped 50 minutes later and we completed the walk. The reward was a vast vista of the Agerola plain, Capri and Sorrento.
The next day’s walk was largely downhill towards Amalfi and ending with our initiation into the peninsula’s bus service. That morning we had been given some words of warning: “Be early for the 5pm bus. It’s the Agerola community’s commuter bus.”
During the twisting, gear-grinding, 50-minute journey on the packed bus, the regulars who had to stand looked thunderous and mouthed the words “visitors” – a mixed blessing.
The fourth day involved a chartered bus to Pompeii and Vesuvius. The rough carparks, poor toilet facilities and haphazard guide service were a surprise, but in a way they added to the experience of the volcano’s mighty, random destruction. Walking on the reddened, gravelly surface around the crater’s rim and seeing into the roped-off areas concentrates the mind wonderfully.
Next day was spent on a tamer walk from the village of Sant Lazzaro to Vallee delle Ferriere National Park. Outlines of large industrial, ivy-clad buildings could be discerned in the valley we passed. These ghostly reminders of a thriving 18th-century paper industry were built in deep gorges alongside rushing streams. In Amalfi we visited a functioning paper mill where beautiful products are on sale.
On the free day I opted to go to Herculaneum, a Roman town destroyed by the volcano, and Ravello. Herculaneum is small and uncrowded; apparently it lacks appeal for the average tourist. But perhaps it’s the destroyed city’s silence that makes people uneasy. The houses, squares and roads are almost perfect and the sad forms of people caught for ever at domestic tasks are tragic. But there is real glory there too in the deep pinks and greens of the frescoes with their trompe l’oeil dado rails and mosaic floors.
Ravello, like Positano, seems to have been built to please the senses and, though the gardens of the Villa Cimbrone and Villa Rufolo like Hieronymus Bosch's painting The Garden of Earthly Delightswere made for the enjoyment of a noble family, maintenance must be back-breaking beneath the glorious escarpments.
Go there
Exodus has eight-day walking tours for €948, including single room supplement for bed and breakfast, most dinners and packed lunches. See exodus.co.uk
Flights to Naples with Aer Lingus cost about €276 return.
