Villa Cimbrone

We’ve had a most enjoyable day.  We were bussed to Ravello, around the headland and up the hill from Amalfi.  What a pretty place.  We walked down from our drop off to the central piazza past many classy restaurants with stunning views.  Ravello is known for its music and arts, particularly its music festival.  Wagner worked on Parsifal and many big names have played, sung here. Also famous movie stars such as Jennifer Jones, Gina Lollobrigida and Humphrey Bogart have plaques noting their residence whilst working on films.  DH Lawrence wrote Lady Chatterley’s Lover whilst in Ravello.

Once in the piazza we had an hour to ourselves so Tony and I explored the local streets and enjoyed the fabulous views.  The area is famous for its colourful ceramics and we were trying to find the dessert dishes we had used in the restaurant last night but were unlucky. We had a look around one of the better quality ceramic factories where everything was hand painted, but could not afford the Christmas tree decoration I spotted sadly!

We retreated to the piazza cafe and were soon joined by others for cuppas before it was time to walk to the Villa Cimbrone, famous for its gardens on perhaps the only large flat area in the town.  The recent cold weather has held back the flowering so much was yet to come but there was still much to explore.  The estate was originally Roman and used to produce fine timber for naval use.  It was then owned by the Fusco family but sadly abandoned at the end of the nineteenth century.  Along came Ernest Beckett, Lord Grimthorpe on his Grand Tour to recover from depression and he was so taken by the estate that he bought it in 1904 and he set about turning it into a work of art.  The landscape was laid out following the influences of Peto, Lutyens and Jekyll.  There are many decorative features including mini temples, fountains, pavilions and statues. Vita Sackville West was responsible for the design of the flowerbeds and the Bloomsbury crowd often hung out here.

We were surprised to walk down in to the crypt to find the vaulting as in Fountains Abbey undercroftnd even more surprised to read that it was modelled on the same, as Lord Grimthorpe came from there originally. The open crypt had spectacular views as did the Infinity Terrace which ran around the headland on which the Villa sits.

Too soon we had to secure a place for lunch before our walk down (more steps!) to Amalfi, so we returned to the piazza and found a bench in a sheltered spot.

On the walk down to Portone, Paolo pointed out the Iron Valley which we should have been using to reach Amalfi.  It is known for its micro climate and species endemic only to the valley but it has suffered a landslide and is closed to groups such as ours.

Amalfi was just as stiflingly busy as our last visit, heavens knows what it is like in the high season, so we bought extremely expensive ice creams and headed to the beach to take off our boots and enjoy a refreshing paddle.

The final part of the day was a visit to the cheese makers in Bomerano where we saw mozzarella being made and moulded and tasted it, yummy ricotta and a smoked variety of mozzarella, accompanied by a cup of red wine!