Buongiorno from beautiful Sorrento. It is 5:30am and we just woke up after a decent sleep last night. The day was yet again massive and filled with tons of things which is usual for Contiki. Contiki is a very fast paced and exhausting way to travel, but it is also very rewarding because you do so much that even though you don’t spend a huge amount of time in each location, you really feel like you have done enough so that if you never return then you can feel like you gave it a good crack.

Today we ventured to the Isle of Capri which is a flash little island located across the bay from Sorrento. Interesting fact: Capri in Italian means “Goat”, so the Isle of Capri is actually the Island of Goats. I love that!

We started the day off with the usual hotel continental breakfast which is actually pretty good here, lots of croissants. Then we walked up our hill to get to our bus to drive into Sorrento. Then we trekked down this massive set of stairs to the docks and boarded a boat to Capri.

We had our first ME time optional. This is a thing that Contiki does that is an add-on to the tour which you can decide whether or not you want to do it, but it costs a little extra. It was a private boat tour around the Island. We opted to do this. It was a pretty overcast day so it was quite good out on the water. The view of the islands was stunning, giant cliffs, caves and beautiful blue water.

We took lots of photos and at one point we got to jump off the boat into the water It was not the warmest. I (Ronnie) did a backflip off the boat into the water which was so much fun. There was lots of jellyfish in the water so we could not be in there long. One guy on our tour got stung by one which would not have been fun,

Capri is famous for the Caprese Salad which is fresh mozzarella, fresh tomato and fresh basil with olive oil. Our tour manager Jimmy knows an old couple on the island who hand-make all the ingredients and make beautiful Caprese Salad sandwiches. He ended up ordering heaps of them for us which they biked down a massive hill to deliver. It was so delicious, so fresh and the combination of flavours was just beautiful.

Jimmy planned a hike for the group up to the second highest point on the island. We decided to not go on this hike because we are exhausted and have been doing enough exercise everyday. After talking to the people who went on the hike – we are confident in that decision. Apparently, Jimmy undersold the difficulty of the hike to everyone which turned out to be very difficult and steep uphill. Instead, we took the cable car up to the main square of Capri and explored.

Funny story, we had a €100 bill and we’ve been having trouble spending it. No places will accept it because they don’t want to change it and I think there was a big issue with the bill and counterfeiting. Unfortunately, it was the only money we had on us and our cards were back at the hotel. We raced around Capri. We found a bank but they don’t let you change it unless you have your passport on you, which of course we didn’t. We ended up googling how to say 100 in Italian “Centi” and asking random stores if they’ll accept it. We went to a pharmacy and bought some moisturiser (so sweaty every day, takes its toll on the skin), which was 15€ and they finally allowed us to use it. We felt so poor that we had to become poorer to get richer haha

Now that we had money we were able to visit this garden that had very nice views.

We were also able to afford our first gelato in Italy (Yes Sarah, we did it!). We have felt like pretty big gelato snobs but we found this little place called Caffe Morgano on the way to the way to the gardens and we were definitely taking this opportunity. We both ordered a pistachio gelato and oh dear was it damn good. Such creamy deliciousness. It is like ice cream, but way better and creamier.

After a bit more exploring of Capri we got back on the bigger boat and headed back to Sorrento. It was about 5pm and Jimmy took us to this Limoncello place that sold all different limoncello. They kind of make it like an event though, they have all these food products like biscuits, lollies, chocolates, balsamic vinegar, alcohol that is all made out of lemon (this part of Italy is very famous for growing lemons). They gave us all free samples of all of it, which was pretty awesome. Aimee bought a bottle of Limoncello to bring home.

We had a little bit of free time to kill, so we grabbed another gelato. This time we shared a watermelon flavoured one which definitely was not as good. I think we will stick to the non-fruity flavours and less touristy gelato places, this one had like 90 flavours and pictures on the wall which should have been a giveaway. We then went and looked at some abandoned water mill thing that was in the middle of Sorrento which was pretty daunting as it was high up but it looked pretty cool and unique.

We then had an included dinner (included within the cost of our tour). It was at a napolitan style pizza place which is something we were really looking forward to trying on this trip as it is how we like our pizza, less ingredients, but better quality. They gave us a demonstration for how they made the pizza and then we sat down and ate a pretty normal garden salad as a starter. They then brought out the pizzas which were huge and delilcious. They were massive slices that were really floppy and so fresh and delicious. The pizza here does not disappoint! We smashed lots of that down with a local bottle of red wine and then they gave us some lemon cake for dessert which was also quite nice. After this we went home for some much needed sleep.

Itemised spending:

Optional “Capri island cruise” – €56
Caprese Salad sandwiches – €14
Towel Hire — €6
Cable car (funicolare) – €8
Moisturiser – €15
Garden of Augustus entry – €2
Pistachio Gelato – €6
Watermelon Gelato – €3
Limoncello – €13
Wine with dinner – €9

Total – €132

Still well under budget.

Tomorrow we are heading to Pompeii and then to Firenze! (Florence).