Bev and Lester's 2015 European Adventure: Three days with in the playground of the rich, famous and beautiful.....and hoards of package tourists

Anyone for the beach? Sorrento

Three days on the Amalfi Coast! Visions of the toned and tanned, beautiful coastlines, colourful houses clinging to the cliffs, sleek yachts, beds of flowers, old stone walls and buildings.

Yes....but! Unfortunately glorious places in the world get invaded by so many tourists and so many touristy shops and restaurants that they quickly lose their appeal, especially in mid-summer, and this has certainly happened on the Amalfi Coast. The buses and ferries and towns are all horribly crowded, albeit beautiful.

View from our room at Ai Bastioni

Salerno waterfront

We are glad we opted to stay in Salerno, and have enjoyed its authenticity. It was a direct train journey from Taormina and also on to Rome. We are staying in an Airbnb that is run really professionally by its resident owners, Ai Bastioni, right on the edge of the old city, so we benefit from local knowledge and help. Lester even had his hair cut at the local barber for 10 euro.

Salerno has been a pleasant surprise and an oasis from our forays by crowded buses and ferries onto the Amalfi Coast. It has an amazing cathedral (which houses the tomb of St Matthew), an Italianate garden of medicinal plants, winding narrow streets with good shops and a pleasant waterfront to make a "passegiata" in the evening.

Positano

Amalfi and Sorrento were just too touristy, we quite liked Positano but our favourite was the hilltop town of Ravello, albeit after a nightmare bus journey up the hill (Standing on an over-crowded bus, racing around hair-pin bends is not my idea of a good time).