Italy: Amalfi Coast Day 4 -- Positano

Given how well everyone slept the night after our coastal explorations (and how much the kids actually slept while we were on the boat as well), Joel and I woke up our fourth day in Amalfi with a new resolve to take a boat vacation at some point in our near future. But, we had a slightly different at-sea plan for this particular day -- we were going to take a short ferry ride to nearby Positano.



According to Greek legend, Poseiden created Positano for a nymph he was after. So Kane was super excited to get a look at this gorgeous stretch of coastline and striped-umbrella beaches (surely you've seen Gray Malin's classic Positano shots). There's not a main square in Positano and while there is a cathedral (of course!), there is little else to do here besides beach, eat, and shop. But we needed a good day of wandering and thought this would work well.

We took our time eating a good breakfast at our hotel and then walked down to the ferry to buy tickets for the 10:30 trip. Ferry tickets are reasonably priced and we'll take a 30 minute boat ride to an hour twisty bus ride any day. The sun was in full effect, so we sat inside on the way there. But by the time we arrived, the kids were already hot and cranky. Fortunately there is a snack bar right at the port and the kids immediately scarfed down coconut and lemon granita.

Our agenda was pretty loose, but Joel hadn't had much of a chance to shop and we'd planned on scoring him some leather moccasins from Tre Denari (I'd spotted the shop in Conde Naste's Traveler section on Positano shopping and then a favorite blogger of mine, Studio DIY, visited on her honeymoon. That sealed that deal). The store is very close to the port and beach so we went there first. Upon first glimpse of the rainbow of soft leather shoes, everyone had to have a pair. Kane of course picked a bright green. Cam, disappointed that they didn't have metallic in kids sizes, quickly rallied and picked a soft fawn pair. I obviously got gold. And Joel picked out a few different pairs as the kids played round after round of constant RPS (I honestly don't think they even noticed they were playing anymore. It was just their default state of being). Tre Denari held our purchases for us at the store so we could wander the rest of the town. Score.

Positano is much more vertically-oriented than Amalfi Town, and even though the streets wander slowly up the hills, we were so glad that we didn't have to make a walk like that at the end of every day. We did a little window shopping, a bit of poking around in various stores. But, the view from the top. I mean. That was the real winner of the day.

The kids were tired and everyone was hungry, so we looped our way down the roads in search of an easy lunch. And man we happened upon the best. sandwiches. ever. We grabbed take away and sat on some stairs stuffing our faces.

When RPS turns violent, you know it's time to move. So after lunch we walked the short distance back down to catch the next ferry. I'd read the schedule wrong and the next one wasn't for an hour, but we grabbed gelato from Collina bakery (the coconut was out of this world) and sat at the ferry dock just hanging. In addition to their routine games, the kids got a huge kick of excitement out of watching a cruise ship pull into port and bring in (in Star Wars looking crafts) a sick passenger. It was quite the scene (and strengthened my feeling that our "boat vacation" will have nothing to do with a cruise ship).

We finally caught our ferry back just in time to catch another fabulous cocktail hour at our hotel's pool. We lounged in the sun for a bit and then headed back to L'abside for another stellar dinner (and to retrieve some of the kids' LEGO pieces which they'd apparently left there the last dinner. The nicest people in Italy at that restaurant, I tell you). We tried "Mama's lasagna" this time and Cam hasn't stopped talking about it since.

That was our last night in Amalfi. We packed everything back up and hit the sack hard. And we left early the next morning to drive back up to Rome, with a very special stop in Pompeii on the way. We'll share that last day with you next week (and then figure out what else we're going to blog about besides our vacation)!