Italy 2023 Trip Recap

TravelEssay

Oct 25

By popular demand from my Instagram peeps, I’m writing to share the details of our recent visit to southern Italy. It was a wonderful trip, and it came at a crucial time for me mentally. After two deaths in the family, a car accident, and then being laid off, let’s just say I needed to find some happiness in this year.

After everything that has happened, I am highly aware of just how lucky I am to have two very alive parents who are interested in spending time with me. I do not take this for granted. And though we have been through some major knocks and losses as a family, including one of my siblings, I’m grateful that we have worked to be a unit that is happy to be around each other. I’ve been really struggling with my mental health, especially with anxiety, and having the rug pulled out from under me professionally and personally has been very hard. With their help and the kismet of this trip that has been on the books since 2020, I think I’m finally coming out the other side. And of course: Thank you for all of the support and notes of encouragement. I needed every single one of them.

And now, onto the recap!

*Fresco detail at a “new money” villa in Pompeii*

*Streets of Palermo, Sicily (with the opera house peeking through!)*

Where did you go?
We visited Naples, Sorrento, and western Sicily (Palermo, Trapani, Agrigento and a few towns between).

Why there?
We are a family of history nerds, and we wanted to visit Pompeii, etc. on our own, and then we joined a tour group of fellow geeks in Sicily to see even more archeology. Sicily is very cool!

What is the vibe in Italy?
The economic devastation to Italy from COVID has been real, so the Italians are very happy to see tourists these days. English is much more common (in signage, menus, etc.) than during my term abroad in college (2006). I didn’t need my emergency DuoLingo Italian brush up as much as I thought I would (scroll to the end of this for the basics).

How was the weather in October?
Unseasonably warm, with highs in the 80s and lower 90s most days. The locals say October is pretty much still summer and has been for the past couple of years.

What was on the itinerary?
I’ll preface all of this by saying: this was not a “vacation,” this was a true “trip.” In my family, this is a very important distinction. We believe a vacation is relaxing and restorative. Usually a beach and lots of napping and reading are involved. A trip is a journey, meaning it can be arduous, uncomfortable and eye-opening. And both are fun! It just depends on what you’re seeking.

Anyways, here’s our TRIP itinerary:

Week 1:

Day 1: Wednesday 📍 SORRENTO

We landed in Naples at sunrise, and a driver took us to our hotel in Sorrento. The mission became staying awake to nip jet-lag in the bud. We made Sorrento the home base of our travels during our week in the Naples/Campagnia region because of its convenient location and day trip distance to/from places we wanted to see.

Sorrento is about an hour drive south of Naples, and is just around the peninsula from the Amalfi Coast. It’s very easy to get into and around. There are some hills and steps, but they are minimal compared to the likes of say, Positano. Our driver was able to drop us directly in front of the hotel with our bags (sorry to this TikToker) and we were 2 blocks from the central square, main shopping street, and a 5-minute walk to the waterfront. The waterfront cliff has an elevator down to beach level/the marinas. For a small fee, you can pick a beach club and lounge/eat/swim should you choose. It was certainly warm enough to do so. Also from the marina, you can take ferries to Capri, Naples, Positano and more.

*Overlooking one of the marinas & beach clubs*

I would describe our hotel as “nice old-school Italian” (ceramic tile floors, high ceilings, thick curtains). It has a beautiful terrace outside the breakfast room, and a hidden garden behind the hotel with heated pool.

There are other more mainstream hotels in Sorrento situated on the hills above, but that means they are a drive into the town. It’s up to you what you’re looking for, but we preferred being able to get out and about without needing a taxi. This was at the sacrifice of sea views, and probably some more bougie modern amenities like spa treatments, but I liked it just fine.

For dinner on the first night, we ended up picking a restaurant on the main drag and really enjoyed the food and service. Highly recommend. My mom had her first ever gnocchi, and they were truly like clouds. I ate delicious half lobster with paccheri pasta and local tomatoes.

Hotel: Antico Mura
Lunch: La Maison Douce
Dinner: Cucu

Day 2: Thursday 📍 Pompeii & Herculaneum

Pompeii and Herculaneum are (to me) the closest thing to time travel one can hope to achieve. These towns are frozen in time with paint left in jars, homes abandoned, and public temples frozen mid-renovation. Exploring can be arduous. Wear comfortable shoes and be sharp on your feet. American cobblestones have nothing on these streets. I also recommend bringing a large bottle of water with you.

Pompeii: Goes on and on forever. It’s huge. And make sure you book a guide (linked ours below) so you can spend time exploring meaningfully with an expert, otherwise you’ll just be wandering in the endless streets.

Herculaneum: Is much smaller, less excavated but overall finer than Pompeii. Due to the difference in location/how Vesuvius’ eruption affected it, there you can see full 2nd stories of Roman houses, wooden furniture and doors in situ, and more details overall. It feels like the Romans are just out of town somewhere.

Both sites are equally worth seeing in their own right. I wouldn’t choose either over the other.

Driver: Eugenio
Pompeii & Herculaneum guide: Gaetano Manfredi (warning: cash only)
Dinner: not memorable so will not share…

*Overlooking one of Pompeii’s city gates*

*Looking down at Herculaneum’s former harbor from present day ground level.*

*A house in Herculaneum with sliding wooden doors preserved.*

*A street looking west towards the ocean in Herculaneum*

Day 3: Friday 📍 SORRENTO

Friday was a recovery day in Sorrento spent walking around town and napping. We took the elevator down to the marina and ate lunch at one of the beach clubs over the water (food was just fine, but the views were amazing!)

Sorrento Lift
Lunch: Marameo Beach Club
Dinner: Ristorante la Basilica - a lovely family-owned place

Day 4: Saturday 📍PAESTUM

Saturday started with a trip down to an ancient Greek site with three temples and a very nice small museum. I remember one of the temples from my art history books because of the rare central row of columns inside. The scandal! We poked around for a couple hours and ate lunch in town.

After, we did an Amalfi coast driving tour (AKA the long way back to Sorrento) with our driver Eugenio. As we approached the hillside, he called out to us: “Do not fall asleep! This is very hard for me!” And we dutifully did not! How could you? The views are stunning.

Driver: Eugenio
Paestum archeology site and museum
Lunch: La Bottega del Gusto in Paestum. I had buffalo mozzarella blue cheese, apples and almonds. Delicious!
Dinner: Meh! Ended up being kind of a tourist trap. Other Sorrento places we were told to try: Storico8, O’Parruccino

*Passing all the fanciest Amalfi hotels was fun*

Day 5: Sunday 📍Naples

Sunday we made our way back to Naples for the day/night in preparation for our flight to Sicily. I know you hear horror stories about the safety of Naples, and to be fair it wasn’t always the best place to be after dark. These days, most areas are tame but we were told by locals that you should watch your belongings and not wear anything super flashy.

Naples Archeological Museum - definitely worth a visit! The new Roman wing is fantastic. You can also see a lot of rooms and floors that were taken out of Pompeii here.
Hotel: Palazzo Caracciolo – 7/10. Pretty, and in a great walkable location. The rooms are small and most center around the palazzo courtyard, which made it very loud in the evening/night (cue the white noise machine). The restaurant for lunch was good. We had to wake up the front desk staff to leave at 5am because the gate to exit was locked… I have to say I think that is a first. 24/7 New York has spoiled me.
Dinner: Insolito La Pizzeria Very good pizza at a neighborhood place our Herculaneum guide recommended. Amazing! Great service too.

*Naples Archeological Museum’s new Roman wing*

*One level of the museum has inlaid a dozen or so original floors from Pompeii (hence the protective booties). I was blown away by this marble mosaic!*

Week 2:

Our second week was spent with a tour group called Elifant Archaeo-Culinary Tours. The company is helmed by Maureen, an American expat food writer, teacher and Italian cookbook translator, and Liz, an archeologist and professor. Their respective husbands tag along to help manage the guests, my fave being Franco, the elder, magical 6’3” Roman husband of Maureen. He helps navigate tricker situations should he be so inclined, but usually you could find him somehow 50 steps ahead of everyone up on a hill, or sneaking up behind you eating lemon granita from who knows where. He could be a Pixar character.

Anyway, our fellow guests were on the older side. At 38, I was the youngest on the trip, though joined by another solo traveler in his 40s, and my trip bestie, a recent early retiree from LA who loves wine and gossip as much as I do.

Note: I was asked by the tour owners not to post details about the niche restaurants we visited. The archeological sites and vineyards are all public, known and famous in their own right, but the food experience is really crafted by Maureen and her connections. Plus, I know how personal food can be anyway, and there is no shortage of good finds in these places. If you do want to be guided by a discerning, opinionated Italian cuisine expert (who will teach you how to shop for olive oil and how to make couscous), you know who to go to.

*Palermo is a UNESCO world heritage site*

Day 6: Monday 📍Palermo

We took an Easyjet flight to Palermo that was very quick and perfectly nice. Easyjet is like the Spirit Airlines of Europe, so breathing costs extra. Kidding, but there are serious bag weight limits, etc. so just be on the lookout for those details if you book with them.

We met up with the tour group for lunch al fresco. It was our first introduction to Sicilian food, which involves lots of sardines, anchovies and fried delights. Maureen was careful to emphasize, “There is no such thing as ‘Italian food’!” Because each region has such distinct cuisine. Live and learn!

Hotel: Grand Hotel et Des Palmes 9/10 - Beautiful! Wonderful front desk staff. Bed and sheets were the best of the trip. Rooms were beautiful, and the breakfast buffet was epic. Cannoli!

This is where the pace of the trip really starts to get crazy. After lunch, we were bussed up to Monreale to visit the Norman Cathedral and monastery. It was gorgeous. It’s a bit of a hike up from the parking lot, but once in town it’s easy to get around. This is when I started to feel like, “oh crap, I didn’t pack enough summer clothes.” The sweat was real. But staring at 4,000 square feet of Byzantine mosaics was worth it.

Day 7: Tuesday 📍Palermo

I knew nothing about Palermo coming into this trip beyond the brief cameo on White Lotus Season 2. I had no idea about the city’s history, with architecture and artifacts from the Greeks, Romans, Normans, Arabs and Byzantines,(not to mention the mafia). All of that heritage is reflected in the appearance of the city itself, which was made a UNESCO world heritage site in 2015.

We visited the Norman palace (Palazzo dei Normanni) built in the 12th century. On the second floor, it houses King William I’s Palatine chapel (Cappella Palatina), which is modeled on Monreale at a smaller scale. Famously, he made foreign visitors wait for an audience in a plain white antechamber, and then would accept them inside the gold chapel, where their socks would be blown off by his show of wealth.

We continued our touristing with a hike to one of the main food markets in Palermo, where we were encouraged by Maureen to buy local capers, anchovies, olive oil, etc.. We ate lunch and walked back to the hotel for a rest before dinner cooked by a “dutchess” (if Sicily still had aristocracy) at her Palazzo.

Palazzo dei Normanni and Cappella Palatina
Mercato Ballarò
Butera 28 Apartments (you can rent in the dutchess’ palazzo, or book a cooking class with her)

*One of the ancient city gates of Palermo*

Day 8: Wednesday 📍SEGESTA, ERICE & TRAPANI

On the way to Trapani, we stopped at the temple of Segesta, a cute lil unfinished Doric temple ruin in the middle of nowhere with a town in the hillside above. This was a bit of a hike up to the temple, and from there the site has a bus ride included in the ticket price that goes up to the town and back.

After that, we traveled to Erice, a beautiful medieval clifftop town. We were behind schedule, so didn’t get to explore the town itself. Instead, we ate lunch and watched some baking lessons from a nona for cannoli, nuns titties—a real name for marzipan cookies. Then we hit a museum in Trapani, and finally our hotel for 20 minutes of downtime before walking to dinner. Phew.

Segesta
Erice
Hotel: Room of Andrea (Trapani) 5/10 Fine. Kind of run down. But great location near the ocean.

*Inside Segesta’s unusual little temple*

*Overlooking the temple from the town above*

*Creeping on some artists at the salt museum*

Day 9: Thursday 📍 Marsala & Salt Pans

Thursday started with a ferry ride to a small island archeological site whose name escapes me. It was very cute and Liz was excited about the “ceremonial pool.” I don’t know that I would’ve gone out of my way to go there, but I’m happy Liz was happy.

Back on land at the ferry landing, we hit the nearby Salt Museum, which was one of my favorite stops on the whole trip. The owner’s daughter took us through the history and technology of sea salt harvesting, and the views of the salt pans were stunning.

We ate lunch at Pellegrino (not that Pellegrino), a Marsala winery, and stayed overnight in Trapani.

Day 10: Friday 📍 SELINUNTE & Agrigento

On our way to Agrigento, we stopped first at a quarry site called Cave di Cusa, where the ancients carved their columns (picture of my dad and an abandoned column cross-section for scale). Then we headed to the Selinunte archeological site, where said columns were used to build temples. At this point in the tour, the temples were all starting to bleed together in my brain, I’m not going to lie. But all of them are so beautiful, you can’t not explore them. Right?

We ate lunch at a stunning vineyard resort called Planeta Estate La Foresteria Menfi, where I ate the best tomato salad and fresh sheep’s milk ricotta of my life. I would maybe go back to Italy just to stay at this vineyard… it’s so lovely.

Once in Agrigento, the spoiling continued as we arrived at the best hotel of the trip:

Quarry: Cave di Cusa
Site: Selinunte
Resort/winery: Planeta Estate La Foresteria Menfi

*Dad (for scale) & column cross-section*

*A temple at Selinunte & ruins of another*

*If I disappear, you might find me here*

Day 11: Saturday 📍 Agrigento

I’m so glad that somehow we saved my favorite location for last. What a beautiful little town! What an amazing site! I loved everything about Agrigento, especially the hotel. Villa Athena actually sits on the grounds of the archeological site, which would never be allowed today but those crazy Victorians were just living it up. We toured the archeological park, ate lunch up in the Agrigento town propper, and then I took a serious nap by the hotel pool.

Agrigento Archeological Site
Agrigento Archeological Museum
Hotel: Villa Athena - 10/10 One of those “I’ll remember this forever” places. Would love to find reason to go back. The hotel has a small, boutique/family feeling. Amazing to be within the archeological site and beautiful rooms.

*View of Agrigento archeology from the hotel*

*Temple at Agrigento & statue of Icarus*

Day 12: Sunday 📍 SOLUNTO & Palermo

We stopped in Solunto with an option to hike up to the archeological site. I had looked up the site the night before and saw how insane the climb was and said, “yeah, it’s a no for me, dog.” I hiked up to the museum to wander around but went no further. My parents went up to the site, but my mom only made it to the top of the first path before seeing that the hike part just kept going and turned around. You can watch a drone tour here to get my drift.

And then we drove back to Palermo for the night and said our goodbyes to the group.

Day 13: Monday 📍 Naples

A day of rain and rest, because damn. We were tired.

Day 14: Tuesday 📍 NAPLES (AGAIN)

Our flight home was cancelled. So we had an extra night.

Hotel: The Britannique - Fabulous. 10/10 would stay again. United booked everyone into a bus and rando hotel an hour out of town as part of the flight cancellation. We said “no, grazie,” because we were done with group activities. Instead, we took our EU-mandated 600 euro compensation for flight cancellation and booked this wonderful spot. We’d previously stayed more downtown near the train station, so this location in the hills overlooking the ocean transformed my experience of Naples proper. So beautiful. The hotel bar had an amazing sunset view. The cocktails and wine list were delightful, the food lovely, and the bed expertly comfortable.

Day 15: Wednesday 📍Back to NYC, finally

The baRE MINIMUM ITALIAN GLOSSARY:

Ciao (hello/goodbye) “chow”
Buongiorno (good morning-afternoon) “bwon-jor-no”
Buonaserra (good evening, dinnertime) “bwon-ah-sarah”
Per favore (please) “per fa-vor-ay”
Prego (welcome/you’re welcome) “prey-go”
Grazie (thank you) “grat-zie-ay”
Bagni (bathrooms) “bah-nee”
Permiso (excuse me) “per-me-so”
Me dispiace (I’m sorry) “may dis-pi-a-che”
Vino (wine) “vee-no”
Acqua frizzante (sparkling water) “ac-qua fri-zan-tay”
Acqua naturale (flat water) “ac-qua nat-ur-ah-lay”
Andiamo (we go or “let’s go!”) “ahn-di-ahm-oh”
Pronto (ready, also how Italians answer the phone) “pron-toe”

Hand gestures work for the rest.

If you’re still reading at this point, I’m impressed. Thanks for coming on the journey with me. Hope this is helpful!

P.S. Here’s a second post on what to pack.

Sarah Tolzmann