Day Trip to Positano, Amalfi Coast
For our 4-day stay in the Amalfi Coast, we decided to make our home base in Sorrento. It's easy to access the neighboring towns via ferry, scooter, taxi or bus! Our first full-day in the area we spent in Capri (best day ever!! read here) and for our second day, we decided to explore Positano– the bustling centerpiece of the Amalfi Coast.
To get to Positano from Sorrento, we had a few options of transportation. You can take a ferry, but we had just done that the day before (to the island of Capri) and we both get a bit seasick. You can drive, but we didn't have a rental car and a taxi is the most expensive option. You can rent a scooter– and we highly considered/preferred this option. We love the freedom of scooter travel! However, the road to Positano is extremely tight, windy, and on a sheer cliff. I had read warnings on many travel forums to never scooter there, because of the dangerous roads and the aggressive Italian drivers. But, we'd survived some crazy scooter experiences in Asia (read: Denpasar, Bali) and I couldn't imagine Italy being worse. But we decided to play it safe, since we'd never seen these roads before, and opted for a bus route. After going there and back, I would have preferred to motorbike/scooter...
The bus is cheap, only a few euros for a day pass. But it's a really (really) windy road, the bus is packed with people like sardines, and both of us also get carsick pretty easily. Thankfully no one on our bus got actually sick, but I felt dizzy, shaky, and queasy for the hour or so even after getting off the bus... and was dreading getting back on for the ride back to Sorrento. In my opinion, the scooter would have been fine! The roads were actually fairly free with very little traffic/few cars on the road, and there's of course a divider for the cliffside. Plus, Shaun is an excellent and experienced scooter-er! Next time :)
As dizzy as I felt, the views of Positano didn't fail to impress and make the bus ride worth it! It's as stunning as you imagine it to be–if not better!
The bus dropped us off up at the top of city, and we found winding stairways and curving roads to make our way down. We finally found ourselves on a main pedestrian road, and the street was lined with shops, boutique, restaurants and lots of fellow window shoppers. Everything in Positano was fabulous and I'd love to buy, but hefty price tags come with the glam.
I was hoping for a beach vacation when booking this trip, but I knew the weather could be iffy (it was early May). The weather was perfect for exploring and enjoying the town, but not quite warm enough to lay out at the beach. Regardless, the lack of sunbathers was in my favor for capturing the iconic lounge chairs at Positano beach.
Two of our close friends from home, Tyler and Caitlin, happen to be in the Amalfi Coast the same time as us! They were staying in the town of Amalfi, on the other side of Positano from us in Sorrento, so we coordinated to meet "at the bus station" at a certain time– each arriving from opposite directions. We figured there would be a main bus station in Positano, similar to Sorrento and every other town we've passed through.
However, upon our bus dropping us off at a seemingly random bus stop at the top of the cliffs, we quickly realized Tyler and Caitlin were definitely at another seemingly random bus stop somewhere else in the maze of Positano– it wasn't a bus "station" at all, just the side of a road. Shaun and I don't have international data, so we can only use our phones when we're on wi-fi. Shaun somehow found wi-fi in the pedestrian street and was able to message Tyler for change of plans, let's meet at the beach instead. Thankfully Shaun was able to find service, because otherwise we never would have found each other!
After enjoying lunch on the beach and window-shopping our way back up to the bus station, we were exhausted from all the stair climbing and decided to catch the bus and head back to Sorrento. Thankfully I got the very front seat for the bus ride back!As beautiful and quintessential Positano is, I'm glad we opted to stay in Sorrento instead. That cliffside windy road would be too much to handle on a daily basis to explore the surrounding towns!