The Sorrentine Peninsula
Rounding a narrow corner, a young man approaches us and immediately unzips his trousers to display what he hopes might be of interest to two strolling women.
Originally posted in January 2023. Have a look at some of the bizarre things that can happen when traveling alone in southern Italy. Or anywhere, for that matter.
This guest house, teetering high on the edge of a sea cliff, is a low-rent, rickety bird’s nest sort of place, but it hasn’t fallen into the sea. Yet.
The journey begins in Sorrento, south of Naples, with a plan to travel slowly up the Ligurian coast. In late October, the Sorrentine Peninsula is decorated with bursts of scarlet bougainvillea, purple morning glory and pink oleander. Lemon and almond trees abound. Bright orange plastic nets are suspended like Day-Glo spider webs under gnarled olive trees to capture the green and black fruit as it falls.
The owners of this shabby place, who speak no English, are very kind. They have loaned me a pair of slippers to wear while my only shoes are drying out on top of the radiator, having been soaked clear through in a sudden afternoon downpour. How many tired feet have been propped up on this balcony rail at the end of the day over the past hundred years, I wonder. The view across the bay is of Naples and Pozzuoli kneeling in the dark shadow of towering Mt. Vesuvius.
It’s nine in the morning, on the rackety bus to Positano. The driver watches cartoons on an iPad mounted on the dash board, while simultaneously maneuvering around the triple-S, edge-of-the-earth turns high above the surface of the sea. The rocky cliff falls at least a million feet down into water as dark and deep as midnight. I realize I am less than two feet and a few seconds from death, should that tablet feature anything noteworthy.
Oh God oh God oh God. I suddenly find myself becoming very religious. I try to focus out the windows on the left side, where twisted cedars and tall pointy cypress line this high, narrow road and hundreds of unfamiliar orange blooms smolder in wild clumps up the slope.
In the back of the bus, oblivious to the danger, a jolly Swiss German group is laughing, yodeling and singing some sort of tramping-down-the-road song. The driver scowls into the rear view mirror, switches off his iPad and tunes a radio to some frenzied Tarantella-type music at high volume.
Thirty minutes of this death-ride on the high road of the Amalfi Coast and we descend safely onto the front porch of Positano, an ancient mountainside village with a small pebbly beachfront and narrow streets so steep they turn into stairs. The colorful homes tumble down the side of the mountain one atop the other, almost into the sea. I walk along the steep narrow, twisting lanes under a lush canopy of wisteria and lemon trees. I am with Greta, a timid woman I met on the bus and who had my arm in a vice-like grip for the last ten miles.
Greta and I don’t speak each others’ language, but have decided via hand signals that we should stick together. We visit the lovely Byzantine Black Madonna in the Church of Santa Maria Assunta. It is an object of devotion among the residents and a tourist magnet, but remarkable and well-worth viewing.
We then walk back down to amble through the high-walled neighborhoods below. Rounding a narrow corner, a young man approaches us and immediately unzips his trousers to display what he hopes might be of interest to two strolling women. Greta and I look at each other, shake our heads, roll our eyes and keep walking.
Not five minutes later, here he is again, pants undone, waiting to delight us once more with his anatomy. I stop Greta, reach into my bag for my camera and tell him to please just hold that pose a minute so I can get a nice photo to take home to my family. Not too keen on that idea, he scuttles off, presumably to find other unsuspecting females. I am sure there are enough women tourists in Positano to keep him busy all year round. If he had any brains he would set up a booth and charge €1 for a peek.
If you enjoyed this story, here is the rest of the journey north to the Ligurian Riviera including Portofino, Santa Margherita and Rapallo in four minutes.
https://sharronbassano.substack.com/p/the-ligurian-riviera-73e
Oh Sharron, it's fantastic to read this again! You've painted such a colourful picture of a wonderful trip, of a hair-raising ride, of wordless companionship between travellers and of, well, the idiocy of offensive wishful thinking on the part of someone who was old enough to know better than to behave in such a way! I loved that you scared him off with your camera! Fabulous writing, as always. I love your travel pieces!
Love your travelogues, Sharron! 💚