ONE LAZY DAY
Your first day anywhere is an adjustment. It's the day you get the kinks out, learn the lay of the land and begin the process of acclimation. When you are only spending two full days and a couple of half days in a place like we are on the Amalfi Coast you have to work fast to not feel like a foreigner in a strange land.
We started off with breakfast. When we booked our hotel we did it without including breakfast. For us this is the way we roll. We never know until we can smell the bacon of that morning if we are all going to have breakfast or not. It may be all of us or a few of us. Or if the night before turns out to have been a rough one no one might have the energy to face a plate of scramble eggs and maple syrup. So why pay for something you're not sure if you are going to use. Today it was going to be just Emmy and me. Rick's stomach did not want to participate. Each hotel has its own way of serving and this one was particularly difficult to figure out. The normal procedure is to come in and then be seated by a breakfast host who notes your room number and offers you their variety of coffees. Here we sat ourselves and went to the buffet area without any sort of introduction. I'm more of a sweets person but Emmy only goes for savory. The buffet was impressive but there were no braziers of cooked meats or egg dishes to choose from. Disappointment was written across her face. There was an a la carte menu on the table and it did include several items like eggs benedict and an meat or cheese platter. I'm using the word platter generously as the portions for everything at this hotel are for the faint of eating. When the waiter arrived at our table he began explaining what was included in the prepaid breakfast. Here's where we learned that at this hotel the hot and savory part of the menu is something you order, it is not set out on the buffet perhaps for fear someone might overstock their plate. At tomorrow's breakfast, should we decide to participate, we'll know now how it works. That's one lesson learned.
Now for the beach, the blurb on hotels.stilla$$holes explained how the hotel had access to its own private beach. This was sort of true. You could access two beaches through the hotel. You paid the hotel for this privilege: 25 euros each day you wanted to use the beach for an umbrella and two lounge chairs. Because there were three of us and they wouldn't do halvsies we paid 50 euros and secured two umbrellas and four chairs. The hotel also provided you with towels for which you paid 10 euros per towel that was refunded when you returned them. Lesson two complete.
The beaches at Maiori are beautiful. The Mediterranean aqua blue waters are almost as calm as glass, I'm guessing due to the bay like curve of the coast here in Maiori. The Italians use way to many vowels every chance they get. We chose our position on the third tier of umbrellas away from the water. This was lesson three and we learned this by chance and not by experience.
The beach is not a fine sand beach; it's a course sand that turns into small rocks and then larger rocks the closer you get to the water. Our position was right on the edge of sand becoming small rock, the kind although smooth still makes you wince when you walk on it. It meant we were on comfortable although hot sand and those in front of us had to do the bunny hop every time they stood up and tried to hot foot it on the pebbles on their way into the water.
We had arrived around 10:30 deciding we'd stay out until one-ish and then go to lunch. All we all wanted was pizza. This became lesson number four. Lunch at almost every place we tried required a reservation. The best I could do with any eateries that didn't look as if they prepared their meals in a microwave was a 2:30 seating for three. We were way too hunger.
We ended up defeated and opted for a place advertising pizza and burgers with plastic chairs and no pretentions. Turned out the piazza was classic and I think even Prue from the Great British Baking Show would have approved. I guess that's lesson four and a half.
Once back at the hotel both Rick and Emmy napped through most of the rest of the afternoon. It wasn't until just before dinner that they both roused. After showering Rick and I went to the restaurant's lounge for a drink. Lesson five: I'm not sure if I'd order another Limoncello spritzer. I was hoping for the smooth sweet taste of the Limoncello but it was way too tart for me.
Lesson six and probably the most important one of all is one we really didn't learn here but one we always rely on when we're traveling: ask for anything with a smile and always learn the words in the native tongues of the country you are visiting for "please" and "thank you". It will get you through many a hard time. This is how we scored reservations at the Torre Normanna restaurant, a seven hundred year old watch tower jutting out into the bay. The smile bought us the help of our concierge. A "grazie" got us an 8:30 table for three overlooking the bay as the sun was doing its final decent.
Here's our dinner:
Appetizers for Rick and Emmy: Six delicious succulent and salty oysters each served cold with slices of Amalfi lemons
My appetizer was a puff pastry stuffed with cod and burrata on a pool of Provolone dei Monaco fondue. Apparently it was so good I must have dived in before I could remember to take a picture
Rick's main course was a seared sea bass sautéed in lemon and capers with a dressing of broccoli and julienne fried leeks.
Emmy chose a pasta for her main course, a handmade scialatielli in a fresh tomato, garlic, olive oil and parsley sauce and then ladened with mussels, assorted clams, shrimp and scampi.
For my main course I went for a local sea bream filet in a lightly herbed broth with olives, capers and vegetables topped with a crisp bread cracker
Once again and I'm not sure if it was the wine that did it but my delicious dessert went the way of my appetizer without the honor of a photograph of its own
The last lesson, number seven, is to enjoy. We have always made travel a priority. In the TAP Airline lounge in Lisbon there's a saying by Saint Augustine painted on the wall that reads: " The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page". It's a lesson that for us is the reason for living, that and gelato.
No comments:
Post a Comment