We decide to start late in the morning (10:30ish) for our hike. We walk up the street to TuttoXTutti and get our hiking snacks. From there we walk uphill, then up some stairs, then up another hill the square in front of the other church in Praiano. Beside this church is the sports complex- a soccer court with astroturf.
We pass the church and turn right up a long flight of stairs. We get to the top (after I've stopped a few times) and reach the highest street in Praiano. We cross the street and walk to the sign that reads "Path of the Gods" with an arrow. From the bottom of these stairs, the top is not visible. There are probably 200 I can see and I just know anther 1000 I can't see.
We start. I stop. We go. I stop. My heart is pounding so hard my ears are ringing. But Mike is carrying my water bottle and he and Helen are about 25+ stairs ahead of me. I stop so many times on the trail that by the time I reach them, they've sat down to take a break and they get up when I get there and head on up the trail.
All in all, we climb somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,300 feet. As we are nearing the top, I start questioning whether we have missed the turnoff for the lower trail. Are we sure we are in the right place? We haven't seen a single sign.
We reach a flat path and I decide to go with it and see where it takes us. At least we aren't climbing anymore. We run into 2 men walking back from Agerola (where they took the bus this morning in order to just do the walk down). They confirm where we are on the map so we head on over to the trail down to the Convento.
On our way, we see a picnic bench in the shade. There's no view from here but its shaded and a good place to take a break and eat some snacks.
A few minutes later we are on our way. We pass the split in the trail and walk on ahead like the travel info person told us to. The views are spectacular! We stay on the path and walk on around to the other side of the hill and the views get even more beautiful! WOW! Fortunately, we run into some folks from California who take a killer family picture for us.
We enjoy the views for a while and then head back down to our house via the other trail through the convent. The convent looks out over the hillside and out at the ocean. I know the sisters here had to leave their families, but the church has such a beautiful spot. Maybe there was some solace in it for them as well.
We kept walking down, down, down. The paths are worn and the rock stairs are uneven. We are all concentrating on not falling. I'm not sure which is more difficult, climbing up or going down. I think this side is a little more gradual but in truth its probably about the same. The tragedy is that you can't look out while you are going down, but the scenery is so phenomenal, I have to keep stopping on the way down too.
We don't arrive back at our apartment until almost 3, so we only stay around a half hour to change into swimsuits and relax without our boots on. Then we set off for La Praia.
The walk down is hard, and thinking about the climb back up is a little painful, but off we go. We reach the beach and it looks like there may only be another hour of sun. So we walk down to the beach and sit a few minutes before getting in. The stony beach makes the water super clear. I am in to my waist and still able to see my toes and the shape and size of all of the rocks around me.
I swim out, with much coaxing from Mike and the girls, to the end of the cove so I can see down the side of the cliffs. I am uncomfortable this far out and I start heading back. Mike swims past me and suddenly, I can see a diver in a wetsuit probably 25 feet below me super clearly. I think he's near the bottom, but I can't see it.
When I get out of the water, we have about 10 more minutes of sun. After the sun passes, we head up to il Pirata for a drink. There I buy the train tickets to the airport that I had forgotten about when I booked the other train tickets yesterday. Done.
We had a yummy seafood pasta dinner for our last night and a chill evening with some card playing and reading. A fantastic end to a superb week!
Off to Rome tomorrow and home Sunday. After this week of R&R, I think I'm ready for home. :)
Today we went on the Path of the Gods hike up the mountain. I understand now why it's called the path of the GODS. It was not built for humans. The only direction, just like the hike in Cinque Terre was up. Dad had this great idea to count stairs on our way up but he said it when we were already a quarter of the way up and no one wanted to climb down just to come up again.
When the stairs ended, it actually became pleasant. Just a sloping uphill with a spectacular view. Along the way, we stopped at a picnic bench to make sandwiches and eat the snacks we bought at Tutto X Tutti. I ate the worlds largest peach and then couldn't manage to eat more than half of my prosciutto and cheese sandwich. YUM! When we got to the top, Mom and Dad made us go a little further up, closer to Nocelle and Positano to take lots of pictures. It was mostly flat getting there and back so none of us wasted much energy.
The pictures were great with city, ocean and cliff behind us. Maybe one of the pictures will make it to the Christmas Cards! The way back down was a lot more difficult. The stairs weren't very stable and some of the time we had to almost slide down the rocks. This was even more of an issue for me because I was wearing white shorts.
We passed a convent on the way down that was right around the halfway point. It was pretty small and it wasn't still active but the whole building was open for unguided tours. The nuns had really small sleeping quarters but the view off their balcony's was absolutely stunning. It would be so wonderful to wake up every morning and see that out the window.
When we finally got back to Praiano, we decided to take one last beach trip. This time everyone got in the water, Mom included. It was great to swim after being so hot and I enjoyed the cold water. After drying off we went to a bar for WiFi. Mom was booking things so Dad and I went to the grocery. We got things for dinner and our last night in Praiano. I can't believe we have to leave tomorrow, I will miss it so much!
Meghan and I woke up at the same time, but this time our parents got up before us. I guess they were embarrassed that they slept in yesterday. We ate a quick breakfast and then left the apartment to go on our big hike. We went to the grocery store first, and got some food for lunch.
When I said big hike, I meant BIG hike. It had so many steps, your head would explode if you tried to count them all. My 
thighs were burning by the 100th step. It wasn't gradually going up, it was straight up, then flat, then straight down. On the flat part we found a picnic table and ate our sandwiches and peaches. Instead of going straight down, like the map said, we went on a smaller path for only ten minutes. The view was way worth it though. It was the prettiest part of the whole hike.
We ran into a nice trio of people, and they took our group photo, and then we took theirs. We went up a little further, and then came all the way down, back to the regular trail. We met some more people that came from the way we were going to, and they said it was really dangerous. They were right. It was even worse than going up. My legs felt like they were vibrating.
We stopped at a small convent on the way down. It even had a small snack bar. The sign said SNAK BAR. We didn't hang around, sadly, but we made it all the way down the mountain without collapsing, but at the bottom I'm pretty sure all of us felt like jelly.
We went back to the apartment and changed into our bathing suits and went to the harbor beach. All of us got into the water, which was a nice change. We stayed on the beach until it got cold. Dad cooked dinner, salad and spaghetti. We played a round of Donkey. It was a nice last day in Praiano.
Stopped in at TuttoXTutti for bread, prosciutto, fontina and some fruit for our morning hike, the Praiano loop up to the Path of the Gods and back by the Convento Domenico. Hiking snacks are so much better here and any small grocer can slice meat and cheese.
We started climbing stairs right outside of the grocery and kept climbing out of town and up into the terraces of vineyards, olive and fruit trees. It was a tough climb, about 450 meters and we didn't come across many other hikers so we had to refer to the map and question our path a few times. Once the path leveled off we found a picnic table and snacked. The view along the trail was spectacular, deep blue ocean, light blue sky and the Amalfi coastline. The girls thanked and thanked me for forcing them to hike. The trip down was tougher for me and my legs were shaking by the time we got back into Praiano.
We stopped into the apartment for a short rest and then headed downhill and down more steps to the La Praia beach for our last dip in the Mediterranean. I even had a hot rock massage (sort of).
Dinner back at the apartment, linguine with seafood, tomato sauce for Helen and a salad. We were all exhausted and it was an early night.
Slept in a bit this morning before we took off for the La Praia Marina beach. This beach has little stones, instead of sand, and in the stones are little bits of broken tile rounded out like sea glass. I collected some of them while Meghan, Helen and Mike swam. It was warm on the beach, but not too hot and the water felt pretty cold to me. I didn't go in.
We walked home for lunch and rest time, up the hill to our house. While Mike napped, the kids and I read and generally laid around. I sat outside looking out at the water from our deck. There is just something that is so calming to sit with a book and every time you look up, the view is so astonishing, you have to stop and watch it for a minute... then find your place again, sometimes start the page over because you forgot what was happening.
We left for the beach Mike called "On Fire". To get there, we have to walk to town's main square then cross the street and follow a path down... down ... down to the water. We started on this path the first Sunday we were here, and since we didn't have swimsuits, we turned around half-way down the stairs and walked back home. This time, we plowed on down the stairs. I was a little excited to see the beach on fire.
We arrive at a concrete platform with orange deck chairs and orange umbrellas. We got there at an opportune time. We passed, within a minute of reaching the bottom, 2 families making their way up the hill. When Mike asks for 4 chairs, we end up with 2 on the front row and 2 almost right behind us. Score 10!
They deliver our beers and water in a plastic bag with handles filled with ice. This is almost too much, because there's wifi too! WOOT! I make our train and hotel reservations while sitting looking out at the phenomenal view.
Mike and Helen jump off the concrete wall two times and I both photograph and video them. Meghan walks down the ladder and gets a little wet. I'm fairly certain she's not jumping off the rock because the water is pretty rough and she might lose her suit. I decided, even though I'm in my swimsuit, I'm not in need of the cooling off. So, I sit back in my deck chair and read my book.
We walk up to the Trattoria San Gennaro in the square for dinner. It's okay, not fantastic, but the view is lovely and I'm glad we have stopped here. We make our way home in the dark. Another fantastic day on the Amalfi Coast!
I had the best day EVER! There wasn't anything to do this morning of any importance, except go to the beach, so I got to sleep in. While I'm traveling, I sleep a lot. Well, actually I sleep a lot anyways. Once I was awake, I had a bowl of chocolate cornflakes and I sat outside and read my book while I was eating. I sat out there until it got super hot.
Later, Dad said that it was time to got to Marina de la Praia (the beach). We walked all the way down the stairs until we got to the sandless beach, that made the water crystal clear. It was freezing but Helen, Dad and I went in the water anyway. We swam for a while, and then got out to dry and joined Mom on the shore. It was lunch time, and we didn't want to eat on the beach or at the little restaurants, so we went back to the apartment. After lunch Helen and I sat down and played cards, read, listened to music, drew and mainly just sat around.
At 3:00 we decided to go to "the beach on fire" as Dad liked to call it. I had never been there before so it was kind of a shock to me. There was no actual beach, it was just rocks and cement. It was also a bar so while you were sitting in the sun you could order a drink from one of the waiters or waitresses that circled the chairs. Helen and I both got a lemon soda which is basically homemade lemonade, with pulp, but carbonated. YUM!!!
When even Helen was tired and we were all hungry, we went to a trattoria/restaurant on the square where I ordered a huge calzone with seafood pasta on the side. It was really good but I couldn't eat all of it so I got to take it home for leftovers!
We basically did the whole run through of yesterday, except this time we did it with Mom and Meghan. Meghan and I both got up earlier then Mom and Dad! Big surprise, because it was later then 8:00.
We went to the small beach first, because Mom and Meghan hadn't seen the awesome beach yet, and you always want to save the best for last. The harbor was much better then yesterday, because it didn't have as much pollution and the water was way clearer, so I could see lots of fish, rocks, and Dad's feet. We stayed at the small beach until 1:00, and we left because it was starting to get really windy and cold, and plus, we were hungry.
We went back to the apartment and ate lunch, and then Dad took a nap. We headed to the other beach at 3:30, and it was less crowded than yesterday. We rented four beach chairs. Meghan and I got Lemon Soda's and played cards. I really wanted to go swimming so Dad and Meghan and I all went swimming. Meghan didn't want to at first, but then she finally caved in and went in with us. Dad and I jumped off the rock, but Meghan took the stairs. I tried to but with my goggles on, it was way too rough. We got out a couple of minutes later. I was exhausted.
We played cards until it got boring. Meghan started reading her book. Stupid as I was, I forgot to bring a book or anything. I tried to take a nap. It didn't work. I went swimming, by myself this time, because no one else wanted to come. I jumped off every rock I could find.
After my like, seventh jump, a lady beckoned me over. I walked to her, a little unsure. She smiled at me and said, "You speak English?" I nodded. "Those boys over there," she pointed at the boys that were jumping off rocks too, "are very impressed that you are jumping off the highest rocks with them." She finished, still smiling. I couldn't see my face, but I was positive it was bright red. I smiled weakly, and said thanks. After that I quickly walked back to Meghan. Embarrassing!!! I could feel myself blushing.
We left the beach at 6:15 and ate dinner on the plaza in a nice restaurant and watched the sun go down.
