The Coast Is Clear

(Seeing Amalfi in a winter light)

Let’s be honest—2023 was the year when everything came together for Italian tourism… and then melted down. A record-setting number of travellers booked summer trips to Italy only to  be  welcomed into a nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, nowhere to sit under a beach umbrella Heat Dome. By late July, messages of “Don’t come to Italy” were trending on TikTok, and people were asking if the Mediterranean might be finished as a summer destination.

The Amalfi Coast was an especially easy target. Too hot. Too crowded. The beaches were rocky and hard to reach. Even if it sounded a little like complaining about the food and the portion size at the same time, there was some truth there. The travel industry built a megalopolis on the back of a few tiny beach towns. Now the perfect storm left everyone to ponder:

How do you see past two million people just like yourself to get a glimpse of the soul of these simple fishing villages, set in the most spectacular scenery in the world?

C and I had been wondering the same thing back in the spring of 2022, while staying at Hotel Parsifal, in the town of Ravello just above Amalfi. When the proprietor Antonio mentioned that the hotel stayed open year-round, we were intrigued.

“We live here anyway, my brother and I and the whole family. This is the only place open,” he explained. “So it is something for the local people.”

Local people? That sounded promising.  We were there in April and already the Spiaggia Grande in Positano had the ambience of a Margaritaville at spring break. If this was pre-season, maybe post-season was what we wanted. We made reservations for January 2023.

All of our Italian friends shook their heads. Amalfi in January? It’s impossible. The weather is terrible. You can’t even get a coffee. Being American, it just made us want it more.

Admittedly, the lead-up looked bleak. In early January, friends were texting forecasts of a three day downpour.  Only one, who grew up on the French Riviera, was blithely optimistic. “Yea, they always say that in these places. The locals just want a rest from the tourists. It’s a trick.  You’ll see.”  C and I packed books, just in case.

It was so foggy when we landed in Rome that we might have been in Milan. I couldn’t help thinking ahead to the famous Amalfi Drive, a razor-thin road that weaves along the coastline in an endless sequence of 180 degree turns. Now I’d be driving it with a blanket over my head. That’s one way to insulate the population from the tourists.

But as we neared Salerno, the skies began to brighten. By Naples, I was trying to find my sunglasses. At first, C and I said nothing, not wanting to jinx a miracle in the making. When we finally pulled into Sorrento for lunch, we were high-fiving like gamblers hitting a jackpot.

“It’s true! It’s all a great big, existential lie!” I cried, standing on the terrace of the Grand Hotel Ambasciatori and looking out at the Sorrento peninsula. To be fair, the hotel was closed, as were all of the big resorts. Still, we managed to find a meal at Ristorante Z’Ntonio, where we ate under the watchful eye of Diego Maradona, soccer legend and patron saint of Napoli, in a fresco that covered one entire wall. Maradona was depicted as presiding over a re-creation of the Last Supper, with a variety of local businessmen and starlets as his disciples. It doesn’t get more Sorrento than that.

When we checked in at Hotel Parsifal a few hours later, Antonio greeted our enthusiasm about the weather with caution. “Yes, a bit unexpected. Tomorrow I’m afraid…” and he grimaced. Was he part of the Big Lie as well?  Or just trying to underpromise/overdeliver?

Built as a convent in 1288, Hotel Parsifal was converted to a hotel by Antonio’s family after World War II. He worked there as a teenager before leaving to become the general manager of the legendary Hotel Danieli in Venice, then returned a few years ago to join his brother in the family business.

Terrace at Hotel Parsifal

Although its terrace garden and views are five-star, the Parsifal has the charm of a simple pensione. On our way to dinner, we passed through the anteroom, where Antonio’s mother was sitting with her grandson, watching The Hunt for Red October dubbed into Italian.

“We are seating on the terrace tonight, unless you prefer to be indoors?” Antonio asked.  Back home, there was a bomb cyclone threatening the Northeast. Here, we had a bird’s-eye view of the Gulf of Salerno, an indigo inkwell pulsing gently in the lights of Amalfi and Minori below. We took our seats on the tiled terrazzo, clinked glasses and settled into the dream.

Despite a starry reputation (Jacqueline Kennedy vacationed there when she was First Lady, visiting her sister Princess Radziwill) and a literary legacy that runs from Boccaccio to Graham Greene, Ravello functions primarily as a kind of safe room to Amalfi; historically, it’s been a center of contemplation more than commerce. The convents of San Francesco and Santa Chiara were established there in the 1200’s, the former by Saint Francis himself.

Perched more than 1000 feet above sea level, Ravello is not a beach town. It’s a penthouse balcony in the hills, with views of the mountain cliffs, the sea, and the lemon groves that line the valley below. When Richard Wagner rode his donkey up the path from Amalfi and discovered the lush Moorish cloister at Palazzo Rufolo in the center of the village, he used it as the basis for the magic garden of Klingsor in the opera Parsifal.

But the next morning, as we made the short walk into town, the magic garden was shrouded in clouds and the rain was pelting an empty central square. Thankfully, we found Duomo Caffè open and filled with a very local crowd.

Hours earlier, Mafia boss Messina Denaro, on the most wanted list for more than 30 years, had been captured in Palermo. What’s usually a chic, outdoor cafe had been transformed into the village meeting hall, with neighbors clustered around the television to watch the action.

After the third interview with the triumphant police chief, we decided to venture back out to the jumble of alleys behind the piazza where the stores sell limoncello and ceramics decorated with lemons, lemon-shaped soaps, and in one small market, maybe even a few actual lemons. Today though, options were limited. Besides the small grocer, the only store open for business was  Ceramiche D’Arte Pascal.

The largest of the ceramic stores offering the classic Amalfitana majolica designs on everything from espresso cups to dining tables, inside Pascal’s shop it’s always a Mediterranean summer. The blue sea, the yellow lemons, the green of the terraced gardens all come to life in a thousand variations of patterns, plates and pots.

In a surprising example of life mirroring art, when we emerged again with our shopping bags, the grey clouds had retreated and left the coastline glistening in a brilliant January sun. Suddenly, we had the perfect moment to visit what may be the most dramatic vantage point on the whole Amalfi Coast.

Villa Cimbrone sits at the top of Ravello like the decoration on a wedding cake. If it seems too beautiful to be true, that’s because it kind of is. While the structure of the villa dates back to the 11th century, much of the rest is a relatively recent invention, initiated at the beginning of the 20th century for the English nobleman Lord Grinthorpe, designer of London’s Big Ben.

Modeled on the Palazzo Rufolo that anchors the town’s main square, Cimbrone and its medieval dreamscape of a garden, which includes a small temple, rose beds, and an open crypt with sea view, was completed in 1930.  Since then, it’s been a magnet for the travel influencers of every era. The last time we tried to visit, the lines to enter stretched down the hill, as if it were Space Mountain.

But on this morning, with the grass and the roses still spritzed from the morning rain, the young student managing the ticket booth put down her book, printed our tickets and handed us the whole place to ourselves.

Even on the Terrace of Infinity, the classic postcard photo-op of Ravello set on a balcony hanging high above the Gulf, we were alone. Our only company was the long row of frosting white marble busts, vivid against the infinite blue of sea and sky. By now, it was starting to feel like our own backyard, which was a cue to leave. Too much more would sour us forever on our real backyard.

So where do you go after you’ve seen paradise? The obvious answer is: lunch. But we knew that unless we wanted another round of RAI’s 24 hour mobster coverage, we would need to venture further afield.

Like the towns of the Cinque Terre in Liguria, the villages of the Amalfi coast are connected not only by a roadway, but also walking paths. With sufficient time and strong hamstrings, one can visit places like Praiano, Atrani, and Minori on trails breathtaking both in their beauty and preponderance of stairs. We decided to walk to Amalfi.

My strongest memory from previous journeys down these footpaths was the fragrance, as you wander through a landscape quilted with lemon trees, verbena, and bougainvillea. In winter, the lemon trees are covered by green netting that stretches across the valley like a giant butterfly net, but the intoxicating profumo remains. As we got closer to Amalfi, we were surprised by another smell in the air.

Built right on the footpath is Da Zaccaria, a restaurant dug into the cliffs themselves. Thanks to  an owner who outguessed the weather forecast, business was booming. Only the Italian aversion to eating outdoors in less than 80 degree heat allowed us to snare the last table on the patio.

After lunch, we made our way down to Amalfi—minus the beach crowd, but with shops and gelato stands open. We were able to visit the cathedral (more stairs, 63 in all) and soak up the African and Arabic flavor of Amalfi— white-washed walls and winding alleys— usually lost in the summer stampede.

As we caught the SITA bus back up to Hotel Parsifal, I watched the passengers climb aboard, mostly locals heading home from work. I realized then that my theory of a mass misinformation campaign to render the Italian coast off-limits in the winter was actually something simpler. It’s a survival strategy.

For all of the jet-set aura of Capri and Positano, the area remains one of simple Italian villages, with a hospitality industry centered around mom and pop operations. You can expect to see the restaurant owner handing out menus, and often a son or daughter in the kitchen. The price for that kind of authenticity is an off-season. It’s a chance for the people, places, and the land itself to rest and recover.

Turns out it is indeed possible to visit the Costiera Amalfitana in the winter. But don’t expect  to be a guest. There are no guided tours, music festivals, Michelin-starred hotels or late night bars. There’s hardly a taxi. For entertainment, you’re on your own. Bring sunglasses and an umbrella, and probably a few books as well.

Antonio looked relieved when the deluge finally arrived on the morning of our departure. “Yes— this is how it often is here, ” he said grimly. “I think it will be raining all week.” Then for emphasis he added, “You have seen something quite unusual in these days”.

We agreed. We never expected to be dining on the terrace or treating Villa Cimbrone as our private garden. We told him we’d already been talking about returning next winter.  Antonio nodded warily. “It’s not for everyone, of course. There are not so many things to do, “ he said, deliberately feeding us the party line.

“But for those who enjoy it…” he concluded, with a sly wink, “we are always here.”