Yet another gorgeous day in southern Italy!

We left Naples around 11:30, but there was a horrible traffic jam, just as we reached the coast, en route to Positano. We were stuck in tunnels for over an hour, but finally got moving and made it to Positano around 1:30 ish. We parked and walked down the hill to the main town and I tried Granita for the first time. It’s basically a lemon slushie, but SO much better! It’s 2 Euros per cup and I got two while I was in Positano.

I was obviously fangirling because I loved Under the Tuscan Sun and part of that film was set in Positano (I am not sure about the filming location), so it was cool to finally visit!

After the first Granita, we walked further down the hill and found a nice restaurant called Capricci. It was a little pricey, but nothing compared to Florence or Venice. The food was DELICIOUS! I got spaghetti with cherry tomatoes, a side of fried zucchini with garlic and mint, and a glass of Prosecco for 23 Euros! It was freshly cooked and light. So good! After lunch I went down to the beach and laid out for a bit. I got some more sun and put my feet in the water. It seemed colder than Capri and dirtier. It was still WILDLY clear. Just a tip: if you go to the beach in Italy, PLEASE bring Reefwalkers because the beaches are rock, not sand, and they hurttt your feet and get hot! It makes the water so much more beautiful though because you don’t have all of the dirt stirred up by the waves.

It was really crowded on the beach, so I just stayed down there for about an hour and then met back up with my friends. We walked back up the hill and I got another Granita before we went back to the car to head to Amalfi.

I’m fascinated by maritime history, so it was great to get to visit Amalfi. It was after 5, so there were no museums to visit or anything, but it was still cool to visit and see everything in the main square. We walked to the church and there was a wedding happening. It was cool to see the bride and groom and entire wedding party on the steps of this huge cathedral and hear the bells ringing. That’s the second wedding I’ve seen here in Italy and it’s so interesting to see that the bridesmaids and other members of the wedding party don’t wear matching dresses or suits and it appears that they don’t have receptions…

We walked around the little piazza for a minute and then went down to the shore. There were lots of couples going hard in the paint down there, so we just went back to the parking area and waited for my friend’s husband to come back to get us.

From Amalfi we drove back to Aversa and it was genuinely the most beautiful drive I have ever taken-only rivaled by the Pacific Coast Highway and some places on the Big Island in Hawaii. We drove along the coast for a good while, through several other small cliff-side towns and then went through the mountains coming out above the valley surrounding Vesuvius…OMG…OUT OF THIS WORLD. The mountains were lush and green and the drive was so neat.

We got stopped by the Carabinieri for a random insurance check and after some confusion regarding my friends’ American insurance (USAA since they are military), they let us go.

The drivers on the road were ridiculous-passing on narrow switchbacks and being assholes, but we made it back alive!

I suggest this drive to anyone that visits Italy and if you are lucky enough, you should try to make it around dusk because the sunsets here are phenomenal!

I think tomorrow we are headed to a castle downtown and then I am going to pack and do some laundry before heading out on Tuesday!