Positano

The view from above revealed a town nestled in the cleft of the surrounding hills. It looked idyllic, but as we approached we found ourselves in a hornet’s nest of activity. The narrow road wound through the town center, with barely the passage required for vehicles and pedestrians. Shops and boutiques items spilled out into the streets from open doors beckoning the crowds inside. The houses sat crouching on the nearby hills, seeming to stand precariously as the cliff divers off the coast. From afar the town looked a paradise, but here in the center, it’s origin as a simple fishing village were apparent. Houses on the hillsides ran the gamut from modern to a bit care worn. In the center of town a large concrete parking garage sat among the shops, a petrol station at roadside filling the tanks of endless traffic navigating the mountain road to Amalfi.

I walked into the town’s center, finding a steep road that led to the docks below. Motorbikes were parked tightly along the road. Seeing no way through to the sea below beyond the dockyard gates, I turned back.

Restaurants along the roadside featured signs and offered services. Our driver cautioned us. ” You should eat in a place without cars and noise. It is important to smell your food, to taste your food without the noise and cars here. Food is more than something to fill the belly”

In a short time we had seen enough of the shops. I climbed the hill behind us to capture Positano’s most fabulous feature- its view. Back in the van, we crawled through the center of town, dodging vehicles and sightseers and pushed farther down the road.