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Briefs 40 Q&A: Penn & Teller celebrate nearly four

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42 Go: Culture, art and food in Mexico City

Departments T R A V E L

44 BEATING THE CROWDS IN ITALYDuring the tourist season, 4.55 million people

visit the Amalfi Coast. From October to March,

however, it is quiet, cozy and quaint.

BY ANNIE SHUSTRIN

T E C H N O L O G Y

50 SOME SERIOUS DOODLINGRyan Germick and friends are using one of the

world’s most visible forums to educate and

entertain the masses — one insightful Doodle

at a time. BY KEN WYSOCKY

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Visiting Italy’s sun-soaked Amalfi Coast has long

been a travel dream of mine. I want to dip my toes in

the Tyrrhenian Sea, an arm of the Mediterranean o8

the southwest coast of Italy, and sip cappuccino at a café

overlooking the vineyards of Ravello. I want to immerse myself in

the Italian language and feel the pleasant idleness of Italian culture.

Basically, I want to have the quintessential Amalfi Coast getaway:

sunshine, pasta and the breezy Mediterranean lifestyle.

Unfortunately, I am not the only one with the idea. This stretch of

coastline south of Naples from Sorrento to Salerno has been a popu-

lar summertime destination for American travelers since the 1960s.

Positano, Amalfi ’s poster child, had its moment in the Hollywood

spotlight in the movie adaptation of Frances Mayes’ Under the Tuscan

Sun. The town of Ravello was once a favorite of Jacqueline Kennedy

Onassis and writer Gore Vidal, and more recently for celebrities like

Susan Sarandon and Bruce Springsteen. And not far o, the coast is

the famous island of Capri, which has attracted jet-setting stars like

Elizabeth Taylor and Mariah Carey. Each summer season, millions

of tourists visit the Amalfi Coast, and the sheer volume changes the

atmosphere of each town.

I decided that to have a genuine Italian experience, I’d need to

trade in my summer sandals for a cozy wool sweater and go in the

o, season. Between October and March, tourism numbers plummet,

as do hotel prices and tra- c. And although rain and cold weather are

a possibility, travelers are paid o, handsomely in one-on-one time

with Italy. In pursuit of my travel dream, I headed out on a December

road trip with husband in tow.

Getting around is easy by bus or ferry, but part of the Amalfi

experience is driving the treacherous narrow roads yourself — a

considerably easier task in low season. We rented a pocket-size Fiat

to take us from Naples to the tip of Sorrento and along the dizzying

zigzag road to reach three popular towns: Positano, Amalfi and

Ravello. But before we hit the coast, we stopped at one of Italy’s

ancient landmarks: Pompeii.

There are many ruins from the Roman Empire, but Pompeii is one

of the most interesting because it is so well preserved. The blanket

TRAVEL

By ANNIE SHUSTRIN

Beating the Crowds In ItalyDuring the tourist season, 4.55 million people visit the AMALFI COAST.

From October to March, however, it is quiet, cozy and quaint.

AMERICAN offers year-round direct flights from Miami (MIA) and New York (JFK) to Milan (MXP) and seasonal service from Chicago (ORD) and JFK to Rome (FCO). Flights operated by US Airways offer year-round service from Philadelphia (PHL) to Rome and seasonal service from Charlotte (CLT) to Rome and from Philadelphia to Venice (VCE).

MAJESTIC VIEWS: Villa Rufolo in Ravello overlooking the Gulf of Salerno (clockwise from top left); Mamma Agata’s meatballs; Pompeii with Mount Vesuvius in the background

44 AUGUST 2014 AA.COM/AMERICANWAY

of burning ash that Mount Vesuvius poured

on top of the city in A.D. 79 protected it from

destruction or weathering. In fact, it wasn’t

even discovered below the soil for nearly

1,700 years. Now you can wander the city

sidewalks, go inside its homes and businesses

and see plaster casts of Pompeii’s citizens

while staring at the somber silhouette of the

volcano that destroyed them.

Visiting Mount Vesuvius is as worthwhile

as visiting Pompeii. The volcano has rich soil

that brings us the Amalfi Coast’s signature

lemons (and its lemon-infused spirit Limon-

cello), as well as Italy’s world-famous San

Marzano tomatoes. We meet with Roberto,

a tour guide with Walks of Italy, who is an

expert on the volcano and the eruption. We

are going to climb to the top of the volcano’s

cone, but the trip can be done only with a

guide. On this early December morning, the

three of us are the only ones on the trail and

the panoramic view of the Bay of Naples from

the top is worth the e,ort.

Our first stop along the official Amalfi

highway is Positano, which is as beautiful as

I had imagined. The colorful buildings cas-

cade from the tops of the cli,s like a water-

fall, all leading down to a black-sand beach

and the Tyrrhenian Sea. During the summer

months, the beach overflows with umbrellas

and bedazzled tourists. In December, how-

ever, we walk on the sand without another

person in sight. We hike through the maze of

near-vertical staircases and bougainvillea-

laced alleyways listening to only the quiet

voices of Positano’s citizens.

Farther down the coast is the port town

of Amalfi, the region’s namesake. Amalfi was

once one of Italy’s most dominant maritime

powers, along with Venice, Genoa and Pisa,

but now it is best known as a vacation spot.

Behind St. Andrew’s Cathedral and the main

square is a web of piazzas and side streets

surrounded by dramatic cliffs — equally

stunning but so di,erent from Positano.

We arrive in town just before golden

hour — that electric time before sunset when

the waning orb illuminates everything in

a golden-bronze glimmer. After a late, lazy

lunch of young clams and perfectly al dente

spaghetti in the sleepy Piazza dei Dogi, we

take in the last gulps of sunset from the edge

of the dock, then get back in our Fiat to find our

final and most anticipated destination: Ravello.

The medieval mountaintop sanctuary of

Ravello is one of the few popular places on

the Amalfi Coast that doesn’t sit right on the

water. But what it lacks in beach umbrellas

it makes up for in UNESCO World Heritage

sites, tiered vineyards and lemon groves.

TRAVEL

MILAN

ROME

AMALFICOAST

IT

A

LY

VENICE

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Piazza Vescovado, the main town square, as

well as the manicured gardens of Villa Rufolo

and Villa Cimbrone, bring tourists to Ravello

in droves. Luckily, we are the only guests

at the two-room, family-run Auditorium

Rooms Bed & Breakfast. Instead of sharing

the property’s view with other tourists, we

share travel stories with the owners, twin

brothers Pasquale and Marco. “Italians don’t

come here in the summer,” says Pasquale.

“They come here for a weekend in the winter.”

Emiliano Amato, the director of Ravello’s

newspaper, Il Vescovado, speaks proudly of

everything there is to see year-round. He

leads us on a walking tour of the town’s most

important landmarks, including several

historic hotels and the city’s cathedral, the

Duomo di Ravello. “It’s very quiet in the o(-

season, but you can still hike the trail to the

town of Minori and visit local wineries,” he

says. Even at night, we feel the community

spirit. A group of friendly local sports fans

invites us to watch a soccer game in the bar

at Hotel Parsifal — an invitation we would

surely miss during a crowded summer.

But it isn’t the hospitality or the medieval

charm of Ravello that makes me fall in love

with the Amalfi Coast. It is the words of a

woman who passionately describes the culi-

nary identity of her home. Chiara Lima, one

of the three master chefs behind Mamma

Agata’s cooking school, charms me with

her smile and her love of the local cuisine

while we chat on our final day on the Amalfi

Coast over a piece of Mamma’s famous lemon

cake. “I want them to feel the real taste of

Italy,” says Chiara about the school’s mis-

sion. Together with her mother, “Mamma,”

and her husband, Gennaro, Chiara teaches

cooking classes at their beautifully reno-

vated Ravello home from March through

December. They also published a cookbook

of the family’s favorite recipes that is sold

only through the school and their website.

Chiara’s cookbook is the only item I bring

home as a token of my trip. It represents

the lesson I learned while visiting a popu-

lar tourist destination at its quietest time

of the year: When a place is as inspiring as

the Amalfi Coast, perfect weather doesn’t

matter as much as the experience. To put

it in Chiara’s words, “When you have good

ingredients, you let them speak.”

TRAVEL

ANNIE SHUSTRIN is a travel writer and a blogger who has written about her neighborhood of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, N.Y., and vacationing in Costa Rica for American Way.

48 AUGUST 2014 AA.COM/AMERICANWAY

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