Postcards from Italy: Amalfi to Reggio Calabria

Since I last wrote it's been a busy few days for us as we made our way from the Amalfi Coast, driving down the 'toe' of the 'Italian boot' and staying at a couple of campsites along the way.

Despite the roads being relatively clear, it seems to take a lot longer to drive anywhere than Google Maps may suggest. Not taking into account stops, plus the fact that the Italians drive much faster than the speed limit (all of the time!) I think it must have taken us twice as long as the estimated drive time each time we've embarked on a trip.

The drives, however, have taken us past some stunning scenery - via high cliffs, through winding mountain roads and picturesque countryside.

The only thing that doesn't seem to get easier is the 'crazy' Italian drivers, so (especially) on the way through a town we've had to really be on our guard, lest a rogue motorist or cyclist should come at us from an unexpected angle!

Our first stop was in Palinuro, a pretty village on the west coast of southern Italy, set deep within a natural park.

We stayed in the very quiet Marbella village camping - which just a couple of weeks before would have been in peak Italian holiday season - but during our stay it was just us and one other family there.

Palinuro - Arco Naturel

We were hoping to try out our new tent, but the September low-season meant they had closed the campsite early, so they upgraded us to a bungalow just 15 metres from the swimming pool and a five minute walk from the beach.

The lack of tourists meant we benefitted from having the pool to ourselves for large chunks of the day, and our pick of sun loungers on the nearby beach.

The pool to myself !

Its location deep in the countryside gave us access to some great farm-based restaurants, with exceptional quality and value locally reared food. If you should ever find yourself in the area then be sure to check out Osteria U'Brigante and Isca Della Donne for delicious homemade pasta, bread and farm reared meats.

On visiting the local supermarket we also discovered good, locally produced wine for sale on tap in the supermarket foyer, where a litre bottle costs just €2!

I accidentally filled a bottle with sparkling red (as opposed to just red) which turned out to be little known delicacy that is in fact as refreshing as it is delicious (I think my previous experience of a sparking red was a bottle turned bad in Wetherspoons back in London!) - at least I've not enjoyed it before!

Even in the aforementioned restaurants, a litre of wine will only set you back €6 so it was the perfect place to leave the car parked up at the campsite and sample the local produce!

Next up we continued our drive south, stopping at Camping Village Mimosa - another holiday village but this one was a lot livelier than the last, despite it still being low season.

The campsite was set next to a beautiful sandy beach - the first we've encountered in Italy so far with actual golden sand rather than pebbles, so it was a welcome place to spend 24 hours.

We've also noticed a distinct shift in the weather since we've come further south: clear blue skies, bright sunshine and a temperature of 30+ degrees by day - scorching!

A sandy beach!

We were able to camp here so we christened our new tent and are pleased to report it is both easy to erect and spacious (enough) inside.

Trying out the tent

Perhaps it's been a while since I last spent a night under canvas (or perhaps I'm getting old!) but a mere foam camping mat doesn't exactly make for a comfortable night's sleep!

My experience was more reminiscent of torture where whenever I was about to drop off to sleep, I would need to turn over to relieve the pain of lying on the hard ground! Fingers crossed our next camping experienced in a few days will be a little more comfortable (mental note to look out for a blow-up lilo to sleep on!)

Postcards from Italy: The Amalfi Coast - September 2015

With the whirlwind of excitement and organisation in the run up to the wedding, I don't think we had given much thought to the honeymoon - so after the long drive back to London from Cornwall, we set off for the airport to embark upon our Italian adventure.

Our first challenge greeted us in the form of the drive from Naples to the Amalfi Coast - and I think it's safe to say that with hindsight we might rely on public transport if we were to do it again! The Italians are renowned for their 'bad' driving, so throw into the mix a hire car and Kev's first experience of driving a left hand drive, followed by the narrow, winding mountain/coastal roads and you get a snapshot of the chaos/stress!

Safe arrival on the Amalfi Coast

Still, we made it - safely and sans accident - a small miracle given the state of the cars that drive along the Amalfi Coast highway. Literally every car has dents, scrapes, scratches and with no attempt to patch them up. The narrow roads, volume of traffic and the Italians' general disregard for the rules of the road makes diving round here a white knuckle ride!

On leaving Naples, we took a very scenic mountain route - though it was quite possibly only me that could enjoy the beautiful panoramas as Kev's eyes were firmly fixed on the sharp turns and steep inclines! We passed through little villages such as Tramonti and Maori on the way and even got caught behind a marching brass band going through one, which only added to its charm.

Atrani

The Amalfi Coast is exactly how we'd imagined it and, unsurprisingly, it looks just like the pictures. It's amazing seeing the houses, stacked on top of each other and carved into the mountain, with the busy highway running along the coast. Each little town has its own personality - we are staying in Atrani, a small village a mile outside of Amalfi itself and I think we have probably visited every cafe/bar/restaurant in its little pizza during our 3 days here!

Amalfi

Anyone for limoncello?

From Amalfi we walked for miles up through the lemon groves and vines up to the mountainous village of Pomonte, affording us spectacular views of the red rooftops of Amalfi below. After a 3 hour walk uphill to the top we decided to reward  ourselves with a glass of wine in the courtyard next to the local church...only to find ourselves the only tourists in the middle of a funeral procession! 

Shortly after our first sip of wine a sombre bell began to chime and all the locals (who were waiting in the bar evidentially) got up and waiting at the top of the steps for the funeral party. Then the vicar arrived up the steep flight of steps, followed by the coffin and mourners - so we were really glad we decided against having a peek inside the church (before we realised what was going on)!

View down to Amalfi

The next day we took the ferry from Amalfi to Positano (having sworn off driving whilst we are here!) which was a great way to see the coastline and a stress free - and not to mention quicker than driving - way to get there. 

Positano is one of the picture postcard views of the Amalfi Coast and one of the best known towns. A bit more upmarket than Atrani, Positano boasted a plethora of boutiques selling clothes, jewellery, shoes, artwork, plus the usual tourist tat!

Arriving into Positano

Positano

Having visited Sausalito in California during my trip to San Francisco earlier in the year, I can see why it is called the Californian Positano!  

The beaches along the coast are pebbly with grey sand, with just a narrow portion allocated as the 'public beach' - it seems no one really visits (certainly in low-season) the private sections of beach with their neatly arranged sun loungers and colourful umbrellas, so locals and tourists alike vie for space on the pebbles.

As you might expect, the Italian gastronomy lives up to expectation - so far we have sampled delicious local seafood and fresh, hand-rolled pasta, crisp pizzas, regional wines, strong espressos and limoncello...all at a fraction of the price of what we'd normally pay in London. 

I think we're going to like it here!

You'd better Belize it! - December 2014

Wow, the end of week two already! From Tulum we took a bus down to Chetumal, a seaside town in the Mexico/Belize border and the jumping off point for the Belize cayes.

After a very casual immigration process leaving Mexico (and consequent delay when the border officials realised there were two passengers who hadn't had their passport stamped, and so proceeded to check everyone's passport again) we were finally allowed to board the boat.

We all looked on in amazement as 65 people were crammed on a very small vessel - and after a few passengers were asked to sit on the top deck (read roof) and a a few on fold out chairs, or on the floor of the boat, off we set, with everyone aboard.

It seems that the smaller the country, the greater the levels of bureaucracy and more complex the official procedures. A perfect example of this was going through customs and immigration in San Pedro before being allowed to continue on to Caye Caulker. Before we got off the boat, we were each given a number and told to line up in strict numerical order  upon disembarking. This was so we went through border control in the same order as our names appeared on the boat's manifest - imagine if all planes landing into Heathrow requested the same procedure!

When we finally cleared immigration and had our passports stamped we embarked a small boat bound for Caye Caulker and twenty minutes later we pulled into paradise.

Caye Caulker is a small Caribbean island, very different in feel to Mexico.

English is the national language and the accent is more Jamaican with hints of creole dialect and laid-back Rastafarian locals. It is definitely representative of the 'Island lifestyle' we have come to love!

Locally made rum is more readily available than drinking water - and probably cheaper too! The most common Belizean cocktail is a coconut rum, pineapple juice and grenadine concoction called a 'panty ripper', offered everywhere two-for-one during happy hour - which itself takes place anytime from midday until around 7pm.

Stout is also really popular in Belize - certainly as popular as lager - so Kev was happy - if only it were the same back home in London!

The cuisine is largely Caribbean - lots of jerk seasoning and rice'n' beans. However Caye Caulker's main speciality is sea food, with an abundance of lobster. Every restaurant from street-side barbecues to the fancier establishments sell lobster for incredibly cheap prices. Our first lobster meal, all-in including sides and drinks cost about £10 each!

We certainly ate well and enjoyed sampling the local drinks on the island. One of our favourite local vendors was the 'Cake Man' who pedals a cart up and down the main street, calling 'cake man!' He sells his wife's homemade cakes and we fully endorse the pineapple upside down cake and the banana bread. Perhaps I should send Kev out on to Winchmore Hill Green selling my cakes! Ha ha.

Caye Caulker isn't renowned for its beaches - in fact there isn't really one, but there is 'the split' (the island was split in two by a hurricane a few years ago) and the old harbour wall surrounded by shallow water and a sandy bottom, which is the perfect swimming spot.

The best way to cool off however is to sign up for one of the various snorkelling or dive tours to take you off to the nearby reefs for the day.

We booked on to a 3 tank dive to the Unesco world heritage site, the famous 'Great Blue Hole'. 

Normally you have to do the Advanced Open Water PADI course to be allowed to dive here, in order to dive to 40m to see the stalactites, however the company we found offered us a shallower dive at 24m, so we could still have the experience of diving the Blue Hole but without the risk of the deeper dive.

Unfortunately visibility wasn't great due to the heavy rain over the previous two weeks - fresh water mixing with the salt water makes it go cloudy - so we couldn't see the stalactites down below, but the second and third dives on Half Moon Caye Wall, and a dive site called the Aquarium were much more rewarding and we saw reef sharks, a turtle, sting rays, lobsters and a large green moray eel.

The Blue Hole is situated in Lighthouse Reef, a two hour (choppy) boat ride from Caye Caulker so only recommended for those with sea legs! Fortunately I seem to take after my grandad and enjoyed the boat ride out on deck watching the sunrise and the dolphins alongside the boat. (This trip is probably not recommended for Hannah or Orlaith!)

After two dives in the morning we stopped on Half Moon Caye for lunch and did a walk to see the nesting colony of red-footed booby birds, though perhaps more impressive were the male frigate birds, who inflate and drum on their red gular sacks on their chests to attract the attention in the female birds flying overhead. 

After four glorious days on Caye Caulker we hopped over to San Pedro on Ambergris Caye, 30 minutes away by boat for the next stop on our trip.

When Madonna sang, 'last night I dreamt on San Pedro...' in the song 'La Isla Bonita' this is where she was singing about...

San Pedro is a lot bigger, busier and more built up than Caye Caulker, with a lot of resort style accommodation to cater for the droves of North Americans that spend their winters here. Like on Caulker there aren't really any beaches - until you take a ferry up the coast towards then north of the island, where there are fewer tourists and lovely sandy beaches.

On Christmas morning we went on a snorkel tour to the Hol Chan Marine Reserve and Shark Ray Alley. We saw turtles, reef sharks, rays, an octopus and hundreds of fish - none of them phased by us (and the other hoards of snorkellers) swimming amongst them.

More exciting however was Shark Ray Alley - a spot where the boats feed the sharks and rays so there were loads of them. On my first peek into the water there were six sharks nearby and as many sting rays - I was a little nervous have the rays swim underneath me after what happened to Steve Irwin, but it seems they weren't interested in me. I even 'stroked' a shark!

The seas here are so fertile - we even saw a sting ray swim by in knee-deep water as we sat and had lunch in a restaurant on a pier. Our snorkel guide also pointed out to us two baby sleeping sharks under the pier their dive boat departs from.

The biggest Christmas surprise however, was Kev's proposal on Christmas Eve - I can honestly say I didn't see that one coming (but did of course say yes!)

We're back in Tulum, Mexico now, enjoying the last few days of warm weather, cocktails and relaxation before we fly home. See you on the other side!

Love Sarah and Kev xx

Mexico, part 1 - December 2014

With 2.5 weeks planned for Mexico and Belize, what better occasion to resurrect the travel blog, we thought!

We had been saving what's left of our annual leave this year in order to take an extended Christmas break in the sunshine - and not having taken any time off since July, a holiday feels long overdue...and it feels good to forget about work until the new year!

So we decided on some familiar territory (Mexico's Yucatan Peninsular)  and some new: Belize's cayes (pronounced 'keys') which are just over the Mexican border at Chetumal.

The day before we left London there were glitches with the air traffic control computer system, so we feared we would be held up (or even have our flight cancelled, if the news was anything to go by). Now, our flight was delayed - but not for the reasons you might have imagined: One of the cabin crew tripped over and cut his head (before we took off) so we had to wait while they called for medical assistance and took his bag off the plane.

Then when we did land there was another plane on 'our' stand in the airport so we had to wait for them to move before we could disembark.

It wasn't a massive delay but we were certainly glad when we finally arrived at our accommodation in Isla Mujeres by 10pm Mexican time (about 4am UK time) - a long day's travel but worth it!

Since then we've been relaxing and enjoying ourselves, hanging out on the beach and sampling Mexico's cuisine (tacos, burritos, quesadillas and chicken mole - a savoury sauce made from chocolate, spices and chilli), and cocktails (something tequila-based for me and rum-based for Kev!)

In Isla we went scuba diving on our second morning - our first dive was in the underwater museum, amongst the stone statues of people, followed by a second dive I the nearby Manchiones Reef - and then we hired out a golf cart in the afternoon to drive around the island (which is only 5 miles long), though Kev's off-road antics meant we had to pay an excess on return for cleaning! 

It was lovely to be back on Isla - which hasn't changed a bit since we were last there 2 years ago, so it was easy to relax into our holiday with such familiar surroundings.

The weather so far has been pretty good - cooler than we expected at around 26 or 27 degrees Celsius, but definitely hot enough in the sun - and scorching compared to England in any case!

Unsurprisingly it doesn't feel very Christmassy over here - there's something about summery weather that just doesn't feel festive, but there are Christmas trees and decorations everywhere, including a few snowy scenes and shivering snowmen which do look a little out of place, as you can imagine!

After 3 days in Isla Mujeres we took the Ado bus (much like a Mexican version of the Greyhound buses in America) to our next stop, Tulum, where we spent the next 4 days.

Tulum is a charming beachside town surrounded by jungle and with a motorway running through the middle of it. 

Our accommodation happened to be right on the main road so we did feel a bit like we were living at a truck stop. In addition to this, we were right by a speed bump so had the constant squeal of big lorries and cars slamming on their brakes in a desperate bid to slow down before the bump, which usually ended in the car bottoming out - it basically sounded like a constant series of car pile-ups throughout the day and night! Still, it's funny how quickly we got used to this and were soon sleeping through the noise.

However on the other side of the premises was jungle, and we were visited one morning by a large family of coates (pronounced co-ah-tees), which are Mexican raccoons. As we enjoyed our breakfast in the garden, twenty-odd raccoons descended on us from the treetops to be fed by the hostel owner - this experience is not to be confused however with eating breakfast (or trying to eat breakfast) with the monkeys around in Borneo! The coates are timid and not aggressive (and very cute!)

One particularly sunny morning, we got up early to go to Casa Cenote - one of the many 'cenotes' or limestone sinkholes across the region. Casa Cenote is situated right by the beach so the water in the cenote was saline, rather than the usual (freezing) fresh water. We hired a kayak, a snorkel and mask and spent the morning paddling around in the water, then spent the afternoon on the adjacent beach, reading and watching the pelicans dive into the sea.

The next stop on our trip is Belize - I'll write you another post from there. 

I hope the Christmas preparations are going well!

Love,

Sarah and Kev xx

Switzerland Photos

Switzerland, September 2013, a set on Flickr.

Switzerland, September 2013

We set off early in the morning on the day after my birthday for Heathrow Airport, bound for sunny Lugano, supposedly the place in Switzerland clocking up the most hours of sunshine annually.

Lucky for us, the weather didn't disappoint and despite leaving London in the rain, we were met by beautiful Italian sunshine, which stayed with us as we crossed the border into Switzerland.

Even though the weather has only just turned autumnal back in the UK, it was so nice to have some summer conditions again! So back on went the shorts and swimwear and we hit the (lake) beach.

After a very quick change in Milan (if only all airports could have you off the plane, through passport control and out of the airport within 5 minutes!) and a quick Italian espresso to keep us awake, we were on the coach bound for Lugano.

Lugano is right on the Swiss-Italian border, so despite having an official language of German, most people speak Italian. If in doubt, English worked best - or certainly better than attempting to speak German or Italian, as everyone here seems to speak a minimum of three languages! Bizarrely we did get chatting (in French!) to an Italian at one point, whilst waiting to cross the road, so we were at least able to communicate a bit, though my language skills were otherwise put to shame in this European, multicultural, multilingual centre!

Lugano is a very pretty and cosmopolitan town, situated right on Lake Lugano. Its proximity to Italy means that if you go on any boat trips you need to take your passport as some of the beaches are Swiss and some Italian. Fortunately we were not caught short!

Switzerland's economic position also means that it's one of the most expensive countries on the continent - to put things into perspective, a bottle of wine in a restaurant costs a minimum of £30 or £40, despite being a wine-producing region, so we really had to do things 'on the cheap!' Lucky for us also that we were able to eat a hearty breakfast in our hostel, and food court 'Manora' kept us fed - and with good quality food - when we did come to eat out.

After a stroll along the shores of Lake Lugano, we headed north-west by train to Locarno, situated at the top of Lake Maggiore.

Whist maintaining the beauty of the Italian lakes region, Locarno is altogether a more relaxed town than Lugano. We were immediately charmed by its cobbled 'Piazza Grande', complete with big band playing popular classics, and lined with restaurants and gelaterias, their tables extending out into the square in the balmy evening.

Our hostel was simple but it did at least fall into our price bracket (not something that the rest of the accommodation in this area can boast) - so we made do with bunk beds and a shared bathroom and enjoyed getting back into the traveller’s way of life – so it was a shame this was just a long weekend away and not the beginning of a six-month trip!

Our second day was spent wandering along the shores of the lake, where we stopped for a swim (or just a wade, in Kev's case!), reading, sunbathing and generally relaxing; taking in the scenery and trying the delay the thought of the oncoming winter back home.

We enjoyed a delicious Italian pizza lunch, washed down with some Swiss beer and some lovely Italian gelato (diet and half marathon training will begin upon my return to London!)

Day three was bungy day - the day I was to do the James Bond 'Goldeneye' bungy jump off the Verzasca Dam: Europe's highest at 220 metres (whereas my previous highest was 135 metres in Queenstown, New Zealand). 

I was somewhat nervous as we approached the foreboding dam - it seemed enormous 'in real life'!

As we watched a few people throw themselves off the platform I genuinely wondered if I still wanted to do it (and at a Swiss price!) but no doubt there really - of course I did!

I had to wait some time before my go - and of the three people directly ahead of me, only one managed to jump - the other two turned back! The clue here was not to look down - just smile at the camera and look out over the mountains! As you might imagine, I loved every minute and smiled throughout the whole jump :-)

Here's a video of my jump:

I sent a few texts once down, reassuring people that I did indeed 'bounce back' then we enjoyed a walk back down the mountain (despite what 'Swiss efficiancy might have you believe, the buses are about as regular as they would be in a Cornish village, so we eschewed the 3 hour wait for the next bus and walked it!) We then bought a bottle of wine (decanted into plastic water bottles since we didn't have cups!) and sat at the end of the lake and watched the sun go down.

Our final day was a rainy one and around ten degrees cooler but it still made for a nice walk by the lake, the clouds low amongst the mountains, almost touching the water in places.

Unfortunately the bad weather seemed to be affecting both London and Milan too so our flight was delayed and we didn’t get home until after midnight (and with work to go to bright and early the next morning, it wasn't ideal), but all in all it was a fantastic trip - happy birthday to me! J