The Journey to Atrani, Amalfi

From the alarm going off at 4am, to finally checking into our hostel at 9pm, we were on the go.

1. We had to drop the car off at Enterprise car hire, which was a good 30 minute taxi ride from Stanstead airport.  When we finally arrived, the taxi, which we had pre-booked was already there waiting for us, early.  Good start - true.  The 30 minute taxi ride turned into a 15 minute taxi ride as our driver 'whizzed' us through backstreets of north London suburbs.  (Quite incredible, but nothing would prepare us for the driving in Italy.)

2. Checking in at Stanstead airport was rediculous.  We qued for what we thought was a good 1 and a half hours, and once we finally made it to the desk, were in quite a state, as according to my watch, the plane was leaving in 15 minutes, and we still needed to get through security, and pay an excess baggage charge, for which the que was a good 5 minutes wait.  They were all looking at us quite strangely, and it wasn't until we asked them what the time was, that we realised my watch was a whole hour fast.  (Also meaning that we had probably only qued for about half an hour - and the plane wasn't leaving for another whole hour.)

But, the strange thing is that we had been going by that watch for the whole of the trip so far.  I hadn't changed it since arriving in London a week and a bit before.  Still to this day haven't worked out why we never noticed it before - we must have been quite relaxed and very much in holiday mode...

3. The flight was budget, and 'no frills' all the way.  We were glad to arrive in Rome.  Until we got to Rome.  Every Italian we spoke to was so incredibly grumpy.  There was nothing at the airport, and we somehow needed to get to a train station, to get a train to Salerno, on the Amalfi Coast.  The information desk would advise that we needed a train to the main train station - Roma Termini - in the centre of Rome (we were hoping to stay out of Rome at this point of the trip).  The people here were grumpy too but we were finally seated on the bus, and ready for the journey.  The traffic on the roads in Rome were unlike anything I have ever seen before.  Pretty soon Sarah and I were beginning to think about the week after next, when we would hire a car, and attempt to drive around Italy on our own.  We were beginning to think that the idea was one of our stupidest yet.

The city of Rome itself, as we saw from the bus, was unlike anything we had expected, and did not look like somewhere we would want to visit.  Our main concern in Italy was going to be security and we were both becoming more and more nervous by the minute.

Tired already, once at the train station, we qued for an hour to buy tickets, unsure if we were even in the correct line.  Not everything was in English, and it felt as through no body spoke any English.  We were told that we couldn't get a train straight to Salerno, but would need to go to Naples.  This meant we would then need to go through the same process in Naples to get a ticket to Salerno, but nothing to be done.

Aware of the challenges ahead, the 30 minute wait for our train seemed like an eternity.  If Sarah had said to me 'Lets skip Italy and go straight to Vienna', I think I probably would have agreed, and she now tells me that she was thinking the same thing.  Its a good thing neither of us verbalised this at the time.  Our opinion of Italy was a bunch of grumpy people, in a dirty city.  Looking back, I can't quite work out what I disliked so much.  We were very tired, I guess that can change a lot.

4. Seats were allocated on the train to Naples, and we were in a cabin with some lovely people - but nobody spoke English.  I made a friend with a two year old, and Sarah and I were both weary of a 'creepy' Italian man sitting across from us, who seemed to be constantly looking at our bags.  We both hugged them tightly, and took it in turns to take snoozes on the two our trip.

5. From Naples, another que, another grumpy Italian train person, another train.  The journey was quicker, but it was getting late, and neither of us had eaten much.  Fron Salerno, we needed a bus.  We didn't know what bus, and nobody seemed to want to help.  Again, nobody spoke English and being 8pm, I was convinced that we had missed the last one.

Champion Sarah finally found someone willing to sell us a ticket to a bus - which arrived as we stumbled out of the station.  Climbing in for a ride of our lives, along the cliffy narrow coastline of the Amalfi Coast.

By this point, I had already had a cry, and had already convinced myself that this 16 hour long journey would be a complete waste of time, and should someone walk up to me and offer me a ticket home to Australia, I would have grabbed it.

But...as the journey went on and revealed the beatiful coastline, I began to wonder if we would be ok after all.  I'll show you pictures as soon as I can.  Sorry, still can't attach any.

We were seated at the front of the bus, and everytime the driver approached a corner, he would toot his horn 5 or 6 times, to alert drivers around the other side of the corner that he was coming, and that he was taking up all of the road.  Motor bikes and scooters are common, and we had some close calls where I was sure the bus would knock one over the edge.

After a quick discussion with the driver, we agreed that he would tell me when we were at our stop.  Atrani was where we needed.  I thought it was Amalfi, but turns out we were in a tiny little village just before the town Amalfi.

Getting off the bus with three other girls.  Hearing them speak I was so excited to hear Austalian acents.  As we all grabbed our bags from under the bus, I introduced myself and we chatted a bit.  They were also from Melbourne and were staying at the same hostel as us.  (Yeay...we had friends.)  They were more sensible, and had backpacks but we all made our way to the hostel enterance.

Gabriel, our host showed the other girls to their room first, and then Sarah and I.  He must have sensed just how tired we were, as he upgraded us from a dorm of about 5 beds, to a private room for just the two of us, at no extra cost.  I was so relieved that we were finally here - hopefully tomorrow I can attach some photos of the beautiful village.  I must go, someone is waiting to use the computer.  I will write again soon.  I'm sorry this entry is so huge, but it was a huge day.