Amalfi - Day 5 in Naples and Amalfi Coast, Italy

Hello, I'm back! The 3-week holiday in Iceland has been absolutely amazing and beautiful - half of me wants to stay there forever but half of me wants to leave because it's getting too cold - it was 2 degrees Celsius in Reykjavik on the day we left! The travelogues will be long and detailed, but we'll have to wait a while for X to edit the photos. In the meantime, I will try to finish blogging all the overdue travelogues first... oops!

So now we are at Amalfi, a beautiful town which is the heart of the beautiful Costiera Amalfitana (Amalfi Coast). The Amalfi Coast, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997, is a stretch of coastline in Southern Italy and is an extremely popular tourist destination, attracting thousands of tourists annually to the coast and to the small towns around it, such as Positano and Amalfi.

The most economical way to get into Amalfi is by bus - simply alight at the train stations, Naples, Sorrento or Salerno, then take a Sitabus from there to Amalfi. From Amalfi, you can take the Sitabus to almost anywhere nearby, such as to hike the Sentiero Degli Dei (Path of the Gods) in Bomerano.

Just walk a little further in and we soon reached the town square, which was already bustling with people even though it's only April. At the top of a staircase lies St Andrew's Cathedral, which dates back to the 11th century.

Andrea Pansa, opened in 1830, is a highly recommended pasticceria when I did my research online so of course I had to go in for a look.

Andrea Pansa offers a wide variety of pastries in which many of them are similar to the pastries offered by pasticcerias in other towns. However, the prices here are a bit more expensive, I guess it's because Amalfi is more touristy than other towns.

The sfogliatella was flaky and crispy and filled with a lemon-vanilla flavoured pastry cream instead of a ricotta filling, which cuased the filling to ooze out with every bite. It's good but a little painful on the wallet.

Andrea Pansa

Via Duca Mansone I, 40, 84011 Amalfi SA, Italy
Daily 0730 - 0100

Eye-shopping (shopping with only the eyes haha) is one thing that I love to do when I'm there - especially the ceramics! The painted tiles look so beautiful but I had no idea what to do with them if I'm to bring them back.

I was dying to bring back something to add to my food photography collection but the ceramics are heavy and pretty pricey.

In the end I only bought a tea towel with lemon pictures on it in Positano - I should really bake more lemon goodies so that the tea towel can appear more often on the blog!

And then it's time for another snack! This paper cone is filled with all kinds of deep-fried treats like squid, shrimps, anchovies, fish fillets and fishballs. At €7 it's definitely not cheap but at least it fills the tummy temporarily! There are a few shops that sell this, try to get one when it's fresh and hot from the fryer. For lunch we had it at a mediocre restaurant, so not going to talk about it here.

The Amalfi town is pretty small and we finished exploring it in a short time. We could have done the 3 to 4-hour Valle delle Ferriere hike which will bring us from Amalfi to an old mill to a waterfall, to Pontone and back to Amalfi again, but I was apprehensive about doing another intensive hike again, so we decided to just hike a portion of Valle delle Ferriere towards Pontone - which turned out to be a gruelling hike with lots of steps. We hiked past a lemon orchard and had a beautiful view of Amalfi, but I gave up before reaching Pontone as I was tired and getting lazy.

We walked back down and hiked the other side of Valle delle Ferriere. This time, we stopped at the abandoned mill for X to grab some shots before heading back. I found the mill super creepy, do you feel the same way too?

After the hikes, I felt that we deserved a treat and so we went to grab some ice cream!

All the flavours are hidden inside the containers, which is very different from other gelaterias which like to "show-off" the flavours they have.

We chose a chocolate and lemon sorbet ice cream cone for €2, very yummy!

Cioccolato Andrea Pansa

Via Lorenzo D'Amalfi, 9, 84011 Amalfi, Italy

Atrani, located just 700 metres east of Amalfi, is the smallest community in all of Italy with its 0.12 square kilometres surface area. Its architecture looks very similar to Amalfi, so you can pop by there for a look! We initially wanted to dine there but the restaurant we wanted to go was unfortunately closed.

In the end we got a pizza and dined in our accommodation - and was treated to this pretty cloud formation over Amalfi! We needed to catch the early bus the next day back to Sorrento (and then catch a train back to Naples), so we didn't hang out much after dark.

And that's all for Amalfi and the other attractions along the Amalfi Coast! The towns along the Amalfi Coast are exceptionally photogenic, but the amount of climbing involved makes me not want to go back there again anytime soon... oops! And don't worry, there's still a last post on the places we visited and food we ate (yes more food!) in Naples coming soon!

Here’s a sneak preview of the next travelogue:

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