Day 1 walking Amalfi Coast Sunday 28/10/18

As suspected, the weather was not great when we woke this morning, and we looked out into white, wet blankness.

Breakfast was a treat, with a range of cereals, 3 different cakes to choose from, yoghurt, home made honey (tasted like leatherwood) and strawberry jam to put on the fresh bread which had just come up from the village. Great tea on offer and apparently good coffee as well.

The people who own this place supplied rolls for lunch along with an apple each, and we helped ourselves to extra piece of cake, which we took along in our packs for morning tea.

Joe, our guide had decided that today we would walk down to Amalfi itself, as he was hoping that the weather further down the mountain would be a bit better - it wasn't .

We followed mostly narrow , stairways down , past many stepped gardens and interesting homes.

There is a small section where a rack and pinion type set up transports goods for the locals.

 Joe did a pretty good job of teaching us how to walk with poles down steps and save our knees, but many of us were suffering by the end of the day and we were all very glad that we could catch the bus back instead of walking back. We did meet some young fellows huffing and puffing up as we were coming down - they wore racing bibs saying "Hoka1010" and we understood it to be part of a masochistic race of some kind.  It sure looked cruel.

Eventually we stopped at a small cafe - where we had a cup of tea in the rain (and used the loo) before heading on towards the sea level.

Eventually we arrived in Amalfi itself (about 700m down) . By then we were pretty well soaked, despite rain wear.  We had worked up a sweat while walking down,  so it was raining inside our jackets! 

Everyone was in pretty good spirits, but we were all a bit disappointed not to see the stunning views we had imagined. At times it was hard to see far at all, which was a pity. 

When we finally made it down to Amalfi the harbour was incredibly rough , with large waves crashing over the sea walls which protect the walking path from the sea. We couldn't imagine having a quick dip to cool off. It would have been frankly dangerous to go anywhere near the sea today.  But it wasn't cold.  

We hadn't realised the link to St John that we would find here - the Amalfi star is the same one used by St Johns and also on Malta (Maltese cross).  This is all about the link between St John and this area. Next time we travel we really must read up on the areas that we are travelling too.  We feel very ignorant and that we could gain more from travelling if we had a bit more of the background already.  It would also have been interesting to visit Rhodes or Malta in this trip (also significant places in the St Johns history) if only we had know the links....

We spent a large portion of our time in Amalfi having a look at their extraordinary cathedral .

This was influenced by various cultures and had various different areas, from very simple to very extreme in decoration and complexity. As often with these places I was dumbfounded by the investment in the decorations and the amazing artwork and expensive historical items in here. 

ancient mosaic

view of the temple spire

amazing ancient decoration

figure of St Andrew

amazing ceiling in the crypt!!!

incredible ceiling

the main cathedral aisle. So ornate.!!

We caught the bus back from Amalfi to San Lazzaro (thank heavens)  - which took an hour or so, but was so much easier on the knees.

Tomorrow the weather will still be terrible, so we are doing a different walk from the one planned (due to the weather)  - we will start early, bus to Amalfi and then walk up and down the stairs (possibly via Ravello) to another small town, before we head back on the bus again. Joe is working hard to try to find walks that will work with the weather.   

We still don't know if we will actually get to Capri at some stage, but it does look like the trip to Pompei and Vesuvius will be a goer.  That will happen on Thursday.