With no time or brekkie we headed off towards termini to catch the metro to Ottaviano for the walk to our tour meeting place opposite the Vatican museum . We grabbed a coffee & pastry along the way & after asking a few people for directions found our group.

The Vatican is a must see. Luckily we decided to do the 'skip the line before general public entrance' tour & we only had to share the Sistine Chapel with a small group of people (on our way back through later it was crammed packed!!!).

Having a guided tur is definitely worth the expense, the guides knowledge of these places really adds to the experience.

Personally I think Basilica St Pietro (St Peters Basiilica) was the highlight of this tour. Would loved to have spent so much more time in there, but we had a train to catch to Amalfi coast. We left the tour & exited the Vatican into a huge thunder storm & pouring rain.....I HATE
thunder. We had no choice but to walk as fast as we could through it to find a taxi to take us back to collect our luggage then onto termini for our
connecting train.

I had my recently purchased rosary beads (bought from the nuns shop, so the had been blessed) held very tightly in my hand, umbrella in the other & prayed I wouldn’t be struck by lightening!!!!

Glad to say they worked, I survived the thunderstorm although we were drenched.

Luckily found a taxi & made it to termini with 20 minutes to spare . Located the other girls who had walked from our hotel & they were all drenched too. The only day of rain so far....when we all had walking to do!!

Luckily the train had wi-fi & I checked my emails to learn that our ferry from Salerno to Amalfi had been cancelled due to the bad weather....great how do we get to Amalfi now????

Urs warned us the SIta (local) bus would be a nightmare with our luggage so it was time to ask Mr Google to find us a driver.

With the second call I made we hit the jackpot, a van with driver was available but we had a 3 hour wait at Salerno. What can you do ‘it’s Italy’ (our favourite new saying). Sadly it meant more eating & of course more prosecco whilst we waited. About 5.30 our very smartly dressed driver arrived in a shiny large Mercedes van to collect us. Very swish & we certainly travelled in style......there was a car change after about 1/2 hour of driving & we thought we were going to be offloaded into a Econovan, but no, it was another Mercedes van!!

We took the road from Napoli to Amali across the top via Furore instead of around the coast but it was still a very scenic drive & certainly entertaining watching the crazy Italians drive around the hairpin bends. Somehow it all works, they beep their horns to warn the other drivers & just drive, it really is survival of the bravest!!!

Finally arrived in Amalfi, not a moment too soon for Di who was not coping well with the bends & erratic driving.

We were unloaded in the carpark on the waterfront with instructions that our hotel was up the street past the church. After negotiating the cobblestones we found the ‘entrance’ to our hotel, up about 20 stairs from street level along a little side laneway!!! We were becoming quite
good at forming a human conveyor belt to get our luggage up & down the stairs of trains etc.

Hotel Amalfi was quaint as has been all of the accommodation in Italy so far. However
after arriving in our room the bathroom had a terrible smell liked a blocked drain. They couldn’t move us that night but the next morning arranged another (larger & brighter) room for us.

After check in was completed we ventured to the ristorante next door for a nice diner then a walk around the town. Very very pretty place.
Was looking forward to exploring more of the town in daylight.