Today we departed Salerno and headed up the Amalfi Coast for (of course) Amalfi and Positano before reaching San Pietro, where we will spend the night. Here is hoping all goes well. We were told traffic would be light this time of year.
Paola, our B&B mom. Here she is making me coffee (espresso)!
The ride out of Salerno was effortless. We made our way to the seafront promenade as quickly as possible, followed that to its end point, and then jumped back onto the city streets. It was a bit busy, as the only "city street" out of Salerno is SS18, strada statale, state road (or highway) 18. It is the old mountain road that crosses the base of the peninsula leading to Naples. It also is the road used to access the newer, more modern Autostrada, similar to our interstate highways, that accomplishes the same trip but bypasses all of the local towns and villages.
But everyone was well-behaved, and after about two miles, we reached the decision point. Straight to stay on SS18 or left for Amalfi? That was an easy choice, and we, of course, went left and descended a long, curving ramp with high walls and backed-up traffic! But there was enough room to slide down the side of the auto queue, and we came to the center of our first village on the Amalfi Coast, Vietri sul Mare.
The main point of entry and cumbersome intersection in Vietri Sul Mare.
Already we could see this was a busy place. Congestion was incredible. And people and cars and buses seemed to go anywhere and everywhere, but somehow in a carefully choreographed operation that seemed to work. We made our way across the street just to take it all in. And, of course, being a transportation professional, I was just curious to watch it all in motion! This sign immediately caught my eye!
A most confusing sign. Was this intended for passing motorists to read?
Initially, I thought it was a mandatory warning to maintain a 40 km/hr speed limit, but after looking at it closely, I see it had something to do with a detour, and I thought, "Not sure how a driver would catch all this info on the fly." But we saw this sign several times on our journey up the coast, and after taking the time to translate it, we discovered it warns, "SS163 road closed to transit at km 40," and then gives alternative routes. By transit, I think they mean buses . . . as in tour buses. Fortunately, none of this applied to us!
From Vietri sul Mare, we descended even further and started the undulating road to San Pietro. The Amalfi Coast is beautiful because of its raw ruggedness. The mountains are steep and come right up to the coast. It's amazing this place was ever settled, but once established, I imagine in ancient times they were considered very secure. Except possibly from the sea!
Coastal roads that undulate like this follow the terrain very closely, and typically on the "in" part of the undulation, you descend, and on the "out" part, you climb. So we were descending to our first low point. This is also typical of where you find settlements and such, as it is also usually a source of fresh water where the mountains drain to the sea. The Amalfi Coast follows this template pretty well, all the way to San Pietro, with one twist. In net gain/loss, you have a net gain; i.e., you climb more than you descend if headed west, which we were. But after tackling the Abruzzo, this was a cakewalk!
A couple of other things we noted, and then I will mostly do a photo dump of my better pics (between us we took about 120!).
Yes, the road is narrow and treacherous . . . for cars and buses and the few trucks we saw. But for cyclists, there is plenty of room!
And because we were traveling west, we were on the "land" side of the road, not the "sea" side. That felt a lot more secure as we were not worried about running off the road . . . and into the sea!
We normally took our lane descending and gave it back climbing.
This gave us a lot more room for maneuvering on the descents, and then we hugged the right edge of the roadway as we climbed. This did not seem to bother anyone.
And we saw plenty of cyclists . . . and the cars behaved very well.
So here are some pics as far as Amalfi:
A "low" point in the road where the undulation is on the "inside," and we have a village to ride through!
We took our time biking to Amalfi. That was the halfway point, and there was no need to rush. At Amalfi, we decided to grab lunch. I wanted to be as far as possible (and practical) from the center of the tourist activity, and there was a lot of that, including huge queues for the buses to Sorrento and Salerno. So we made our way down the quay all the way to the seawall and found a proper establishment to eat in, Ristorante La Smeraldino, established in 1949!
Lunch at Ristorante La Smeraldino with Amalfi centro and the harbor in the background.
It was in Positano that we first heard rumors of a road closure ahead of us due to fire. Since my Italian or their English is not the best, and since we really had no alternative, we pushed on.
I blew through this road stop without so much as a "hello" and only realized it when I stopped to see where Mark was (and wanted to make sure he got through as well).
But I couldn't get through this one. Only two miles from San Pietro. I think they made us wait about an hour and then decided it was OK for motorcycles and cyclists to go through! Cars had to wait longer still!
After we arrived, within an hour we could see serious smoke as the fire crested the mountain top behind the hotel. By the time we turned in, we had made plans to evacuate! We set the alarm for 2:00 AM just for a reality check, and all seemed "calm" but still burning. Domani, domani!
The fire behind us at around 6:30 PM or so. All that's visible is smoke.
