5 Days on the Amalfi Coast

A day-by-day itinerary for Amalfi Coast, Italy: real activities, restaurants and hotels with prices and booking links. Copy it and make it yours.

Amalfi Coast, Italy · 5 days · 22 activities · free to copy and customize

Day 1 — Sorrento, the sensible base

13:00 Circumvesuviana or Campania Express from Naples (€5). ≈€5 (or €15 on the tourist-friendly Express with luggage space), 70 min. Sorrento beats staying IN Positano: flat streets, real prices, and every boat and bus starts here.
15:00 Sorrento hotel, 4 nights (€720). ≈€180/night with a lemon garden if you're lucky. One base, no suitcase-hauling on 400 stairs — the coast works as day trips.
17:00 Sorrento old town & Villa Comunale terrace. Free. Cliff-edge views to Vesuvius; the Marina Grande fishing village below for aperitivo.
20:00 Gnocchi alla sorrentina & a limoncello (€35). ≈€35. The limoncello is local law; the good stuff is cloudy and family-made.

08:30 Morning ferry to Positano (€15). ≈€15, 40 min. The SITA bus is cheaper and legendary for the wrong reasons — the ferry gives you the postcard arrival instead of the cliff-edge standing room.
09:30 Positano, top to bottom. Free to wander DOWN the stairways (never up, if you can help it): bougainvillea lanes, ceramic shops, the Duomo's majolica dome.
13:00 Lunch above Spiaggia Grande (€40). ≈€40. You pay Positano prices exactly once per view — choose this one.
15:00 Beach hour or Franco's spritz (€25). Loungers ≈€25 at the main beach (Fornillo is calmer and cheaper); Franco's Bar queue moves at sunset speed.
18:00 Ferry back to Sorrento (€15). Golden hour on the water, the whole coast lit sideways.

08:00 Bus to Bomerano trailhead (€4). ≈€4 via Amalfi/Agerola connections — start early; the trail is shadeless from late morning.
09:00 Sentiero degli Dei hike. Free. 7.8 km high-line traverse, Bomerano → Nocelle, the whole coast underfoot. Proper shoes, 2L of water, and the DOWNHILL direction — the 1,700 steps from Nocelle to Positano at the end are knee-tax enough.
13:30 Lunch in Nocelle or Montepertuso (€25). The village terraces above Positano serve the hike's reward at half the seafront price.
16:30 Bus/ferry combination home (€10). Legs done. Gelato in Sorrento is medicinal at this point.

08:30 Ferry to Amalfi town (€17). ≈€17. The republic that named the coast — the Duomo's striped facade owns the piazza.
10:00 Amalfi Duomo & the Paper Museum (€8). Duomo ≈€3, the medieval paper mill ≈€5 — Amalfi supplied Europe's documents before Gutenberg changed the trade.
12:00 Bus up to Ravello (€2). ≈€2, 25 minutes of hairpins to the coast's quiet balcony, 350 m up.
12:45 Villa Rufolo & Villa Cimbrone gardens (€15). ≈€7–8 each. Cimbrone's Terrace of Infinity is the single best view on a coast made of views; Wagner wrote Parsifal's garden after Rufolo's.
14:30 Long Ravello lunch (€35).
17:30 Back to base (€17). Last ferries leave earlier than you expect — check the board on arrival, always.

08:15 Fast boat to Capri (optional splurge) (€22). ≈€22 each way, 25 min. Skip the €120 'Blue Grotto + island' packages: do the Gardens of Augustus (€2.50), the Anacapri chairlift to Monte Solaro (€14), lemon granita, done.
13:00 Lunch in Anacapri (€30). Upper Capri eats better and calmer than the Piazzetta.
16:00 Return, pack, aperitivo (€22). Or skip Capri entirely for a Sorrento pool morning — five days on this coast should end restful, not breathless.

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