Thứ Hai, 15 tháng 7, 2013

Italy city breaks: Naples is an incredible "anthill of humanity"


By

Jenny Coad




PUBLISHED:


05:28 EST, 26 June 2013




|

UPDATED:


05:28 EST, 26 June 2013



Not everyone warms to Naples. One friend tells me starkly that it is ‘a dump’.


Then a couple staying in my hotel pronounce it ‘horrible’ as they scuttle off to sweeter-smelling Capri, the chic island 19 miles away in the Tyrrhenian sea.


They are missing out: Naples is theatre of the best kind. It wears its colours with bravado and offers life of every sort on its streets. In his book on the city in 1944, travel writer Norman Lewis wrote about ‘that anthill of humanity’. He said that were he reborn, he’d choose to be born in Italy.


Tired image: Naples is a city that rewards those who take the time to explore it – and understand its charms


Zip up on the funicular to 13th century Castle Sant’Elmo (a £1.10 ride) and you can see the ‘anthill’ Lewis was talking about. From the empty castle roof, old palaces, bronze domes, terracotta coloured homes, their terraces trailing geraniums and tumbling bougainvillea are laid out below in every direction. All is serene. A breeze lifts the air from the Bay. Vesuvius sits in the mist beyond.


Below Sant’Elmo, near the funicular station Piazza Fuga, is Villa Floridiana, on Vomero Hill, a peeling 19th century villa, now the museum of porcelain.


There are more sweeping views here from the Balcony Belvedere – of smart Chiaia, and the sea beyond. Inside, porcelain-topped canes, 18th-century china dogs, gold-patterned tea sets will thrill antique lovers. Neapolitans the colour of toast sunbathe on the scruffy lawns around.


The port below is one of the busiest in the world. Containers, mainly from China, are piled high. Cranes are poised for action.


I am staying in Hotel Romeo, on the edge of the port.


The bar, on the ninth floor, offers thrilling twinkly views, best enjoyed over an Aperol spritz. The doorman wears a top hat and there is a cigar room. Smoking is part of life in Naples. Old ladies with brilliant white hair puff away, teenagers flick hair and ash.


Brooding presence: Mount Vesuvius is usually visible wherever you are standing in Naples


The old town is within walking distance of the Romeo, and it’s as full of intrigue as Dickens’s London.


The streets are dark and narrow with all sorts of smells, not all welcome. Washing is strewn from balconies, votive candles glow in kitsch wall niches and open shutters reveal families eating and chatting (at volume) in their tiny homes.


Alexander Dumas wrote: ‘Of Naples’ upper classes, only four families enjoyed great fortunes, 20 were comfortably off and the rest had to struggle to make ends meet.’


Transactions in Naples have a Fagan-esque quality. Prices are subject to surprise rises, but shrug it off, or it will drive you crazy. Enormous churches pop up amid the din.


The purgatory church on Via dei Tribulani has a black, shiny scull outside, smoothed by people’s strokes and kisses. Baskets are winched from top floors to the grimy pavement. Graffiti covers the whole place.


Streets seem to be arranged by theme. Nativity Street specialises in ecclesiastical ornaments, including Pope mannequins. The San Sebastiano Quarter swells with music, guitar shops and AC/DC blaring away.


VIA dei Tribulani is also the place for pizza. Naples is, of course, home to this much-loved dish. I wonder if San Gennaro, the city’s Patron Saint responsible for keeping Vesuvius at bay, has something to do with the heavenly pizza, too.


In Il Presidente it’s served at plastic-coated tables and costs between £4 and £6. Awards for the Pizza World Championships decorate the walls, photos of Bill Clinton with the chefs attest to its glitzy reputation.


An easy walk from here is the Archaeological Museum, with its extensive collection of statues and exhibition on nearby Pompei and Herculaneum. It is an airy space filled with sculptures, that once graced the Farnese gardens in Rome. Hercules At Rest is vast.


He would have towered over the foliage – Farnese must have been some playground.


And if it is playgrounds you are after, there are plenty of these within easy distance of Naples. The sheer beauty of the Amalfi coast, an hour’s stomach-churning drive away, provides reflection after the city’s rambunctious ways.


Sacred spot: Jenny found a refuge from the noise of Naples at the Monastero Santa Rosa, near Amalfi


Here, a stay at Monastero Santa Rosa is a tonic for the spirit. This former nunnery stands on the rock face, close to Amalfi town, and looks out to the sea as though from a platform in the sky. I am sure the nuns would approve of the thoroughly peaceful atmosphere, though the bell tolling in the local village calls in cocktail hour these days, rather than prayer.


The nuns’ vegetable garden is well tended. The chefs use the ingredients in the Italian restaurant, and all the salad comes from its hard-working slopes. The spa, once the nuns’ wine cellar (they had the right idea) uses products from the ancient Florentine pharmacy, Santa Maria Novella.


They smell sublime. And a candle massage using melted oil would convert the most ardent atheist. Divine smells are a theme. There is a wall of jasmine in the garden which I long to emulate at home.


The infinity pool juts out of the rock face. You can lie on the edge and spy on the fishing village, Conca dei Marini, far below.


No surprise that the hotel is full of newly married couples. They have plenty of proposals here, too. Recently, a very modern one, with an Italian woman popping the question to her beau. Good for her.


The Monastero offers a shuttle service into Amalfi or down to Conca, where you can catch a boat with one of the locals for £4 to Amalfi marina. This is the way to travel, with the coast looming above you in all its glory. The owner of Monastero spotted the building from the water on a trip such as this and determined to buy it.


Star attractions: Jessica Alba (left) is a big fan of Amalfi – while the lovely Monastero Santa Rosa (right) occupies a pristine spot on a high rock face, dispensing splendid views of the region’s celebrated coastline


Amalfi itself, where Hollywood actress Jessica Alba loves to stay, is touristy, though the Cathedral houses frescoes from the school of Giotto in its Cloister of Paradise and its baroque interior is truly sumptuous.


After only five days in this wonderfully rich region of Italy, I am inclined to agree with Norman Lewis about wishing to be reborn in Italy.


Travel Facts


Monastero Santa Rosa (0039 089 832 1199; www.monasterosantarosa.com) has rooms from €375 per night (low season) including breakfast.


The Romeo, Naples (0039 081 017 5001; www.romeohotel.it) has rooms from €220 per night including buffet breakfast.


Return flights to Naples on British Airways (0844 493 0787; www.ba.com) cost from £73.







The comments below have not been moderated.



Every country has its good and bad points.



Jo

,


Shropshire, United Kingdom,

26/6/2013 22:27


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A good staeting g point for trips to Capri, Pompeii and Amalfi coast but avoid Naples itself.



Cassandra44

,


London, Canada,

26/6/2013 21:45


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WHY would you include a picture of jessica alba in an article about Italy??? Are we supposed to care that the il-educated nouveau riche are everywhere? And I see even the author could not scrape up a reason to actually STAY in Naples, Amalfi is the draw.



Lynn

,


Springfield VA,

26/6/2013 17:28


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