Naples, Italy

Start of my Highlights of the Amalfi Coast tour from Exodus Travel, June 15-22 Arrived at Naples airport around noon after an uneventful flight, with a stopover in Amsterdam. At Naples, I had to wait about 7 hours for pickup by Exodus Travel which scheduled their buses to meet an evening flight from London. Tried to find something to do in Naples, but the store luggage place was full, so there was no place to stow luggage. Instead I hung around the airport, had a nice leisurely lunch outside. Pizza and wine in Italy, for the first time in 3+ years! Interesting to note that they now offered digital menus via a QR code: it was a good thing that I had activated the international data plan on my phone.

Could not resist taking a photo of the delicious looking pastry at one of the cafes in the airport.

I finally met some members of my tour group. Most were from the UK, a nice gentleman from Australia and a family from the US. About a third of the group signed up for the highlights tour (bus trips to Amalfi towns) while the rest were going to hike the trails of the Amalfi Coast. I had considered doing the hiking trips, but since I will be doing the Calabria Coast to Coast hike after this trip, I decided to save my energy by doing the bus tour.

We boarded 2 minibuses to the Bomerano – a tiny village on the west side of the Agerola Valley, 1hr 20m south of Naples. The Hotel Due Torri, surrounded by vineyards and orchards, would be our base for the week. But it was dark when we left the airport, so were not able to see much of the landscape. I had a nice chat with Mary, a lady from England, who appeared to be a world traveller. We arrived at the hotel way past dinner time, so we were led to the dining room for dinner. We had a sampling of Italian appetizers, a simple pasta and fruit for dessert. We also ordered wine (at 3 euro a glass, it was a bargain). and a briefing before getting our luggage and keys to our rooms.

Our tour guild Veriano introduced himself and gave us a briefing of what to expect. After dinner, we got our luggage, key to our rooms and turned in for the night. It's been a long travel day and I slept well.