Honeymoon Part 1

One of the best parts of getting married? The honeymoon! After much thought, we decided to embark on a European tour over two weeks covering London, Italy, Switzerland and Paris.

As the designated travel planner, I researched tons of cities and regions, but after many trips with Matt, we luckily know what we like and don’t like, so it was fairly easy to figure out where we’d want to go. In Italy, we chose the Amalfi Coast and Tuscany, which were both much more amazing than we could’ve imagined.

Before I get to our favorites, here are some interesting things to note about Italy, mostly related to food:

Bread, napkins, and olive oil are an automatic cover charge at pretty much any given restaurant. That means if you eat every meal out since you’re traveling, you will be welcomed with three baskets of bread throughout the day.
Most restaurants don’t open for dinner until 7:30 pm. For those of us who are hungry every two hours, this takes some careful planning and preparation to make sure you can survive the hours leading up until dinner.
Just like bread, cheese and meat are staples in every meal. Luckily it’s not processed because if I ate like that in the US I would have easily gained 20 pounds while on our trip.
Most bars give out potato chips or peanuts with your drinks, but don’t serve food.
All bathrooms are for guys and girls. And many don’t have toilet seats. Luckily I am a pro-squatter.
Just like Mexico has homeless dogs walking around, Italy has cats. Tons of cats.
Italians know how to maximize their planting. Every public street has loads of fruit trees growing things like blood oranges, pomegranates, and lemons. Our hotel in Sorrento had kiwis growing on the pathway leading to the front door!

Amalfi Coast

If I had one word to explain the Amalfi Coast, I would have to use magical. Between the views, the cascading bougainvillea, and the crystal clear water, it’s quite the vacation spot.

While in the Amalfi region, we stayed in Sorrento for one night and Positano for two nights. While they look close, traffic adds on significant amount of time, and therefore getting around the Amalfi Coast is pretty expensive. The bus is a cheaper option but of course takes even longer.

We found that every website acts like everything is so close but in reality, it takes about 45 minutes to get to and from anywhere you want to go. I thought we would be bopping from town to town, but unless you want to spend your trip savings on transportation, I would definitely recommend choosing one or two places as a home base and make sure they are close to any other city you want to go.

Transportation Costs

Car from Naples airport to Sorrento – 110 euros / one hour
Car from Sorrento to Positano – 80 euros / 45 minutes
Car from Positano to Naples train station – 120 euros / one hour
Ferry from Sorrento to Capri – 76 euros / 25 minutes each way

Sorrento

Ristorante Fuoro. The lemon shrimp pasta was the best pasta dish I’ve ever had in my life. Top that off with the caprese salad and a bottle of Fuore Marisa Chrome Costa D’Amalfi and we were in absolute heaven.
Hotel Favorita bar. We were in awe of the architecture and design. On level two there is a secret garden which is perfect for a night cap and there is also a rooftop bar but we didn’t make it over when it was open.
Villa Angiolina. We loved staying at this adorable boutique hotel. It’s affordable and easily walk able to the downtown area.

Capri

There are two options for getting to the main part of Capri from the ferry landing: hike up the hills or take the shuttle. We opted for hiking up the hills which would’ve been pretty miserable had it been summer, but luckily we were in need of a little post-night out sweat, so it worked out great.

What we didn’t know about about Capri was how much upscale shopping there is in the main part of town. To avoid the crowds, we cruised around the smaller backstreets and hiked up to the Arco viewpoint and saw about three people on our way there.

Le Camerelle. While the food wasn’t great, we liked being able to see views of both the water, mountains and the town from here. Plus, it’s super cute, great for people watching, and the white wine is delicious.
Giardini di Augusto. For a very small fee (I think it was two euros each), you can get check out this beautiful garden perched on a hilltop and get some pretty spectacular views of Capri.

Positano

Chez Black. The pizza here is incredible. I went for the buffalo mozzarella pizza since mozzarella di bufala is apparently extremely popular in Italy.
Le Terrazze. Drinks on a cute outdoor patio with awesome sunset views.
Lucibello boat charters. For 120 euros, we chartered our own wooden boat for 5 hours. This turned out to be an amazing way to check out the Amalfi Coast – from the water! It took us about an hour to get to Amalfi, where we got out and grabbed lunch. On our way back, we grabbed some cheese, meat and wine from a couple local shops and had ourselves a little boat picnic in the cove near the Emerald Grotto.
Fly Bar. This extremely cool lounge is above Music on the Rocks, the late night hot spot in Positano. It’s pricey, so you may as well splurge on your 19 euro cocktail instead of paying 14 euros for their (light) beer. Worth it for the views and atmosphere!
Max. A friend recommended this place for dinner and we were blown away. As a huge fan of Cucina Enoteca, I had to get the ricotta stuffed squash blossoms of course and they did not disappoint. Max doubles as a cooking school, in case you want to make an activity out of it.
Villa Rosa. With some incredible views of the ocean and the classic adorable-Positano-houses-on-the-hillside, this boutique hotel serves breakfast on your own private patio. The perfect honeymoon spot. Not to mention it’s in a great location, across from 1 Michelin-star restaurant La Sponda and up the street from the main downtown area.