Positano and Amalfi, Italy – Nov. 9-10, 2024 – NNs On the Wind

November 10, 2024November 12, 2024 Kathleen Ennen

Positano -Amalfi ferry: boarding at Positano ferry landing

November 9-10, 2024

Our flat in Positano is comfortable but some of the lights don’t work so parts are dark. The nearby restaurant wasn’t opened. We made a trek to a mini market and started to learn of the great verticality of the town. For the trip back up we found the bus stop and the tobacchi shop where tickets are purchased. We’ve come to rely on omelets with cheese, Italian ham, and tomatoes for dinner when we can’t find a restaurant.

In the morning we walked down to the ferry dock and beach area. We had no idea that the 20-25 minute “walk” was more than 80% on downward stairs. Hundreds and hundreds. It was hard to imagine if all the flats along the way got postal delivery!

The weather was favorable for the ferry trip to Amalfi. This served in 2 ways: 1) avoiding the difficulties of driving along the Amalfi Coast and, 2) viewing the beauty of the coast from the water. Due to the off season however, the schedule only allowed us to arrive at 1030 and depart at 1200. We didn’t want to risk departing at 1500 and being late back to Naples where we were to drop the car and get to the port.

We found a café serving brunch and had some great coffee and a nice meal. Then a short walk around the area of the main square and very large ornate church before heading back to the ferry dock.

We were able to keep the car parked at the flat for the day which was helpful as there is no parking in Positano!! Most people are on scooters or motorbikes. We got organized into the car and headed back to Naples. It was Sunday and traffic was light. We found an open gas station and put about a gallon of diesel in it to top it up. The return was simple, park on the top floor of the garage and drop the keys in a box.

The trains and metro were running again. We found our way to Line 1 and rode a couple of stops to the port. We were well ahead of the departure/loading for the overnight ferry to Palermo. We found a café nearby and sat for a couple of hours and had a light supper. At 6:30 it was time to board the ferry, get settled in our cabin, wander the boat, and watch the departure activities as we left at 815pm.

We have traveled over the years and retired in 2017, when we started on a nine month long adventure departing in December 2017. In the past we’ve traveled to Sri Lanka, Africa (several times), Turkey, and made a number of trips to Europe, and St Lucia. Our 2015 trip to Turkey, took nearly 3 weeks to explore Istanbul, Cappadocia and the areas in proximity to Izmir.

This is a chronicle of our travels, past and present. We love to travel by trains, planes, ships, and cars – and love sailing whenever and wherever we can.

We retired from the US General Services Administration, the Federal Government’s landlord! Thom worked at planning and large scale program management of numerous projects and Kathleen, a registered professional civil engineer, was a project manager for many infrastructure and building renovation projects, including both design and construction aspects, in New England, Florida and the metro DC area. We lived in Washington DC for 12 years and upon retirement sold the house, putting a few things in a 5’x5’ storage unit and started traveling.

On return to the US in September 2018, after traveling to 21 countries, we bought a Class C RV – 2019 Thor Freedom Elite 24FE. We enjoyed our week long camping trip in New Zealand in a small converted van with few amenities, so this seemed liked a good way to tour the US. We hope to visit family along the way and as many US National Parks as possible.

UPDATE – the Covid pandemic made travel more difficult for us. We were abroad for several months when the pandemic started and returned to the US in July 2020. After several months in the RV to visit Utah and Albuquerque NM, we moved east, bought a house on the Northern Neck of Virginia, and sold the RV. For 2021 and 2022 we tended to our new house and cottage, gardens and various boats including a 18’ 1977 Marshall Sanderling catboat and a 25’ Steiger Craft Chesapeake fishing boat, and kayaks and a canoe. Hopefully travel will start again one day!!

May 2022