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Aldo! + The drive to Positano + Amalfi


We got up really early today and our day started waiting for the bus outside the base Kyle works at. We are headed to Positano and Amalfi with our favorite person, Aldo! It was a perfect day out too, the air was really nice and pretty clear for Naples. 


You could see Mt. Vesuvius from across the bay which was pretty spectacular, it got even clearer throughout the day, this was still early morning.

Our itinerary for the day was drive to Positano, get off the bus there and explore the area. Then from Positano we were going to take a boat over to Amalfi which is only 45 minutes away by boat. The bus driver would meet us in Amalfi. We could spend time in Amalfi then hop back on the bus and drive back to Naples. But as we have learned before with Aldo, the "itinerary" is just a guide to what we will actually be doing that day. Which is what happened within a few minutes of getting on the windy road to Positano. Aldo knew a guy who owns a little shop that he makes beautiful inlay woodwork pieces. Aldo was using this for us to have a bathroom break since there wouldn't be one for quite sometime as well as being able to explore this little shop. We were in luck too because the master was in the house and was hard at work on some beautiful little puzzles. We got to watch him work which was really cool!


These are the cliffs next to the woodworkers shop, what a crazy backyard!


This is the master woodworker at work. The machine he is working on sucks air in so all the pieces stay in place and he uses a tiny pick to pick the little pieces up and place them where they need to go, like a puzzle. They explained to us that they would take balsa wood and dye it whatever color they needed and cut those out on their different drill press machines, some were electric and some were run by hand or foot.





After the stop we got back on the bus and kept heading towards Positano. Aldo pointed out all the vegetation to us along the way too. Italians grow everything out in those hills! There were every kind of fruit tree you can imagine plus nuts they also had vegetable gardens of all kinds as well. Its crazy the amount of things they produce on these crazy hills! The roads are so windy, narrow and steep you would think that it would be hard to flatten out a piece of land to grow crops on, but they have it figured out. All the cherry trees were in bloom, there are lemons and orange trees everywhere as well as chestnuts, walnuts and olives. 



 Mae

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