Look but don’t buy

The Amalfi Coast is better to look at in passing than to stop in if you don’t want to bust your budget.

The coast road undulates round stunning mountains that plunge into a restless sea, with fishing settlements of all sizes nesting in lush green valleys. But there’s a high price tag attached these days, even if you’re just sitting down to a coffee. 

 We get severely stung at a hilltop snack bar, which is little more than a shack run by a seemingly friendly and hospitable family. Our own fault for ignoring the warning signs but annoying and expensive all the same. Takes the shine off the view a bit. 

 Having said that I wouldn’t have missed it. And we very much enjoy taking a very competitively priced, if basic, beach cabin for three days just outside Salerno from where you can see the Amalfi coast.  

 You can also bathe in the same fabulous sea. When we arrive in the dark, threatening to swim nevertheless as it’s so hot, the campsite owner cautions us to take care as the seas, ‘she is angry tonight.’ 
 He’s right, so we only venture in up to our knees, but you can feel the pull of the waves even so. Next day we swim in the crashing rollers and get tumbled on the sand and pebbles for our pains.