Many of us have favourite holiday places, these are places that are memorable, sometimes we visit only once, others we return to again and again. I always think that there are too many wonderful places in the world to just keep doing the same thing each year. But its personal. As I haven’t travelled now since Autumn 2019, I have been thinking more aboutt past holidays destinations.
Italy is a beautiful country with lots on offer, I think my favourite place is the island of Capri. This small island is just off the coast of Naples on the Amalfi coast. Some may feel that’s it's an expensive over-commercialised destination crammed with day-trippers. But no-one can deny that Capri has earned it's fame for many reasons. It’s natural beauty, delicious cuisine, world-class shopping, walking trails, historical buildings and stunning vistas.The combination of island simplicity, natural beauty yet with a busy, cosmopolitan lifestyle, offers something for everybody.
There are two separate towns on the island of Capri as well
as the port. Capri town, with its well-known attractions and famous shopping
streets has a tangible deluxe feel to it. Anacapri (Old town) is more residential
with quiet lanes and a traditional feel. From here you can take the chair lift or funicular to the top
of Monte Solaro.I am scared of heights but this was worth it. So take a few deep breaths.
This peaceful Mediterranean retreat yet fashionable meeting
place has been popular since roman times. Despite its size it was a destination
on the grand tour attracting everybody, from philosophers to princes, wanting to
spend at least a week, if not months, experiencing the dramatic land and seascapes and the hospitality of the islanders. Many of these visitors
decided to stay for the entire year. It was the place to see and definitely
the place to be seen. You can fully understand why it has been a long preserve
of celebrities and the super-rich needing a hideout to rest and let their hair
down for a few weeks.
Steep cliffs rise majestically from an impossibly blue sea
with elegant villas covered in wisteria and bougainvillea. If you take a stroll
along via Tragara, this is the path that takes you past the once luxurious
private villas that are now 5-star hotels. You
will discover the Faraglioni rocks, the symbol of the Isle of Capri and be
rewarded with spectacularly, wonderful views. Take a bench seat, they are s
placed around the lookout area and marvel at the view of the glorious coastline
and sheer drops.
In this unique and enchanting spot, Villa Lysis, was built in 1904 by Count Jacques d'Adelswärd Fersen. Villa Lysis is as eccentric as the nobleman himself, who withdrew to Capri in self-imposed exile to escape a series of scandals in his home country. Edouard Chimot, was commissioned to design a Neoclassical decadent refuge, which Architecturally was mainly in a Art Nouveau style, his elegant, luxurious home was both reserved and opulent at the same time. The villa was Dedicated to the youth of love and the Latin inscription above the front steps “AMORI ET DOLORI SACRVM” was a shrine to love and sorrow. In 1985, Villa Lysis passed into possession of the Italian state and the building was restored in the 1990s by the Lysis Funds Association (founded in 1986) and the Municipality of Capri. In 2014 the Apeiron Association began a restoration program to transform the house into a cultural centre and event venue. I visited in the mid-90s and loved the feel and vistas of this romantic villa, having seen the more recent pictures perhaps it has lost a little of its charm.
Close-by, is where the Roman emperor Tiberius had built
his Villa Jovis two millennia earlier. Tiberius made it his home when Rome
became too hot. If his biographers are to be believed, he got
up to all sorts of scandalous behaviour inside his imperial
cliff-top villa. You can still visit the ruins of his villas. For more than a decade in the early part of
the first century AD, this picturesque Italian island was the principal home of
the emperor, Tiberius. (Known as the Tyrant) He lived a life of extraordinary
debauchery, fortified by the finest food and wines served by nude handmaidens. Troupes
of beautiful youths of both sexes, gathered from all corners of the Roman world
and he hosted endless summer orgies, so by all accounts a good time was had on
Capri.
In equal measure to his lechery, however was his bloodlust, he watched his enemies being tortured before being thrown 300ft off the
cliffs into the sea below. Close to the Emperor's apartments was a precipice
called Tiberius Fall, because from it, he would dispense with unwelcome
visitors or disobedient servants, rumour has it even unwanted wives.
Capri is definitely worth visiting, whatever your budget as you’ll
enjoy some sublime moments and take lovely photographs, it what must be one of
the most iconic photographic settings.
