Day Fourteen. July 19
Finished class at 1pm, lunch at Fratelli di Bufalo, run home to change and off to the beach! Our mission was to head fifteen minutes north to the neighboring town of Vietri to meet our friends. Now, we weren’t really sure where in Vierti the bus would take us or exactly where the beach was, so when we were taken to the town center high on the hill, away from the water, we weren’t too happy. Cate, Pia and I made our way town a long, narrow, and winding road. Unsure of how far we needed to walk I waltzed over to a guy I spotted sitting in a gated courtyard.
“Dove la spiaggia?” in my best I’m cute, American, and lost voice.
He told us it was a pretty far walk down this road, we huffed, turned to leave when he told us to wait a moment and picks up a walkie-talkie. We make out the words “belle” and “ragazze” and after a short conversation with the other end he calls us into the courtyard.
My Italian Superman explains that we are at the entrance to a very beautiful and private beach. Normally payment/membership is required but its fine for us to walk down and use it.
From where we were we could not see a beach at all, so we cautiously made our way down weathered staircases and paths winding around trees, bushes and rock to the most beautiful beach. Boy was I glad I stopped to talk to that guy.
We were met by the other end of the conversation who told us we could use the beach at no cost for the afternoon. We picked our beach chairs and umbrellas and made a B-line for the water which was the perfect temperature.
The beaches in this area are all pebble beaches with washed up broken pottery and glass, which is always fun to collect. We were able to walk out in the water pretty far and Cate and I decided to face our fears and swim out about fifty feet. Glad I did it!
Caught some afternoon rays, applied our leave in conditioners, and made our way back up the hill to Vietri around 6pm. After the most delicious gelato I’ve had yet, back on the bus to Salerno. Once back, grabbed a drink, sat on the Lungo Mare for about an hour and walked home around 8pm.
Perfect Day. One to Remember.