Salerno
145 places
- Nature & hiking
Tempio di Atena
Massa Lubrense
Near the tower survive the traces of the sanctuary of Athena that legend says was founded by Ulysses, where the Greeks worshipped the goddess sheer above the sea.
- Views & panoramas
Positano — punto foto classico
Via C. Colombo/Sponda
From the bend of via Cristoforo Colombo, at the entrance to the village, Positano reveals itself all at once: cascading houses, the majolica dome and the sea closing the scene.
Sacred artChiesa di Santa Maria Assunta
Positano (SA)
In the heart of Positano, the dome of yellow and green majolica rises above the roofs; inside, the Byzantine icon of the black Madonna watches over the village facing the sea.
- Sacred art
Madonna Nera
Positano
In the church of Santa Maria Assunta a Byzantine icon with a dark face keeps watch over the sea: legend says it was she who gave Positano its name.
- Nature & hiking
Montepertuso
Positano
Above Positano, a hole carved in the rock pierces the mountain and frames the sky: legend credits it to the Madonna, who defied the devil.
Views & panoramasLi Galli
Positano
Three islets offshore where Homer placed the sirens, and where later Léonide Massine and Rudolf Nureyev chose their own refuge on the sea.
- Free beaches
Spiaggia di Fornillo
Positano
A path sheer above the sea leads away from the Spiaggia Grande to the pebble cove the people of Positano keep for themselves, in the shade of the torri saracene (Saracen watchtowers).
- Free beaches
Torre Trasita
Positano
The Saracen tower rising on the spur between the two beaches, a sentinel of stone now turned private home, closes every postcard of Positano.
- Free beaches
Fiordo di Furore
Furore
A strip of beach wedged between rock walls, beneath the bridge divers leap from; here Rossellini and Anna Magnani sought refuge.
VillagesAtrani
Atrani
The smallest borgo (old village) in the South, gathered in a ravine among white houses and stairways; in its church the doges of the Amalfi Republic were crowned.
CastlesTorre dello Ziro
Scala/Atrani
A cylindrical tower on a sheer ridge between Atrani and Amalfi; here legend walls up Giovanna d'Aragona, the last duchess, and her fate.
Sacred artVilla Cimbrone — Terrazza dell'Infinito
Ravello
A balcony of marble busts suspended over the gulf, where the gaze meets nothing at all: Gore Vidal called it the most beautiful view in the world.
- History & archaeology
Villa Rufolo
Ravello
The gardens that inspired Wagner's magic garden of Klingsor; in summer the stage hanging over the gulf turns music into a window on the sea.
- History & archaeology
Auditorium Niemeyer
Ravello
A white wave of concrete with a single eye flung wide open on the coast: Oscar Niemeyer's Mediterranean vision, curved and foreign among the stones of Ravello.
Sacred artDuomo di Amalfi
Amalfi
At the top of a steep stairway, the striped Arab-Norman façade; beneath the altar rest the relics of Saint Andrew, brought here from Constantinople.
Sacred artChiostro del Paradiso
Amalfi
Interlaced Moorish arches and palms that filter the light: a thirteenth-century cemetery made for the nobles of Amalfi, as silent as a garden of the East.
- History & archaeology
Antichi Arsenali di Amalfi
Amalfi
Stone vaults opening onto the water, where the Republic built its galleys: the only medieval arsenal left on the coast, memory of Amalfi's sea power.
Sacred artConca dei Marini
Conca
A handful of white houses sheer above the sea; below the village opens the Grotta dello Smeraldo, where a ceramic presepe (nativity scene) rests underwater.
- Sacred art
Monastero di Santa Rosa
Conca
Clinging to the cliff, the convent where the nuns invented the sfogliatella; among cells facing the deep blue, the recipe born behind the cloister still perfumes the air.
- Sacred art
Scala e frazione Minuta
Scala
The oldest village on the coast, stretched out facing Ravello; in the hamlet of Minuta a small church keeps its frescoed crypt in silence.
Nature & hikingTramonti
Tramonti
The green hinterland of the coast, where thirteen hamlets scatter among lemon groves and old Tintore vines, far from the sea and its noise.
Sacred artAbbazia rupestre di Santa Maria de Olearia
Maiori
Carved into the rock along the road to Salerno, an abbey of three chapels stacked one above the other; fragments of Byzantine frescoes hold on where oil was once pressed.
- Sacred art
Capo d'Orso
Maiori
A headland whose rocky profile makes it look like a bear; on the mountains behind it climbs the pilgrimage to the sanctuary of the Avvocata.
- Free beaches
Baia di Erchie e spiaggia del Cauco
Maiori
A fishing village hidden between Cetara and Maiori, its narrow beach held between Saracen towers; the little cove of Cauco is reached only by swimming or by boat.
- Free beaches
Spiagge del Duoglio
Amalfi
Four hundred steps drop from the main road to a beach of pebbles and clear water, the hard-won prize for anyone wanting away from the crowds of Amalfi.
- Free beaches
Santa Croce
Amalfi
Reachable by sea or down a long stairway, a cove beside a rock arch the sea has hollowed out; the water here is the green of glass.
- Free beaches
Marina di Praia
Praiano
A cleft in the rocks holds a handful of fishermen's houses and a tiny beach; just beyond, in a cave over the sea, people dance at the Africana.
- Free beaches
Cala della Gavitella
Praiano
The only beach on the coast kissed by the sun until sunset, looking out towards Positano and Capri; you get there down hundreds of steps, or by boat.
VillagesCetara
costiera est
A fishermen's harbour wedged between rock and blue, where the colatura di alici (anchovy essence) keeps the ancient taste of the sea in a few amber drops.
VillagesVietri sul Mare
costiera est
The gateway to the coast, where glazed ceramic dresses façades and domes, and every alley smells of fired clay and turquoise sea.
Nature & hikingGiardino della Minerva
Salerno
Terraces of medicinal plants step down towards the gulf: a garden of simples tied to the Scuola Medica Salernitana, where medieval herbalism still breathes among pergolas and fountains.
CastlesCastello di Arechi
Salerno
Perched on the Bonadies hill, it has watched over the gulf of Salerno for more than a thousand years: Lombard stone, crenellated towers and the sea stretching to the Costiera Amalfitana on the horizon.
- Sacred art
Duomo di San Matteo e cripta
Salerno
Beneath the Norman naves rest the relics of the evangelist Matthew, in a baroque crypt of marble and mirrors where the half-light turns to gold.
- History & archaeology
Acquedotto Medievale ("Ponti del Diavolo")
Salerno
Pointed arches stride across the valley in the old heart of Salerno: legend says the devil raised them in a single night.
History & archaeologyPaestum
Capaccio
Three Doric temples stand intact on the plain, columns of golden travertine that at sunset still seem to be waiting for the gods of Magna Graecia.
History & archaeologyVelia (Elea)
Ascea
The ancient Elea of the philosophers Parmenides and Zeno, where among olive trees and ruins opens the Porta Rosa, one of the first round arches of Magna Graecia.
- Nature & hiking
Cascate Capelli di Venere
Casaletto Spartano
At Casaletto Spartano the water falls over rocks clothed in maidenhair fern, forming waterfalls and emerald pools in a cool, hidden gorge of the Cilento.
Nature & hikingOasi Grotte del Bussento
Morigerati
At Morigerati the river Bussento surfaces from the darkness of a cave after a long underground course, among ferns, mosses and a damp wood protected by the WWF.
- Nature & hiking
Oasi WWF di Persano
Serre
A wetland on the river Sele where herons and otters people the reedbeds and mirrors of water, a WWF oasis of silences and wingbeats along the Piana del Sele.
- Free beaches
Spiaggia del Pozzallo
Camerota
A cove of white pebbles squeezed between dark cliffs and the clearest of seas, reached on foot along a path or by boat from Marina di Camerota.
- Free beaches
Spiagge del Marcellino, dei Gabbiani e della Sciabica
San Giovanni a Piro/Scario
Along the wild Costa della Masseta open pebble coves between rock walls, reachable by boat from the harbour of Scario, where the water stays crystalline and the shores almost deserted.
Free beachesPunta Licosa
Castellabate
A headland of holm oaks and Mediterranean scrub thrust out over the sea, with the islet and the lighthouse where legend places the siren Leucosia.
VillagesSanta Maria di Castellabate
Castellabate
A seafaring village of little squares looking onto the water and pebble beaches, made famous by the cinema, where the evening smells of salt and jasmine.
- In the water & diving
AMP Castellabate — snorkeling e diving
Castellabate
In the marine protected area the posidonia meadows shelter groupers and sea bream, a transparent seabed to explore with fins on among rocks and submerged caves.
Free beachesArco Naturale di Palinuro e grotte di Capo Palinuro
Palinuro
An arch of rock mirrors itself in the water of Capo Palinuro, where the sea caves, first among them the Grotta Azzurra, set the sea alight with cobalt reflections.
Nature & hikingMonte Gelbison (Santuario del Sacro Monte)
Novi Velia
At 1,705 metres, on the summit of Monte Gelbison, the highest Marian sanctuary in Italy commands the Cilento: you climb through beech woods and mist towards a sea seen from the sky.
- Nature & hiking
Madonna della Neve
Sanza
Set into the white rock of Monte Cervati, the highest peak in Campania, the sanctuary is reached on foot up there, where every summer the Madonna della Neve climbs in procession.
History & archaeologyTeggiano
Teggiano
A medieval borgo (old village) perched above the Vallo di Diano, a maze of alleys and churches, with the Castello Macchiaroli still guarding the memory of the barons' conspiracy.
- Nature & hiking
Valle delle Orchidee
Sassano
Every spring the meadows of Sassano light up with dozens of species of wild orchid, a valley that blooms of its own accord among the mountains of the Cilento.
Nature & hikingSacco
Sacco
A silent borgo (old village) of stone portals at the foot of Monte Motola, its abandoned old quarter still clinging to the cliff above the Gole del Sammaro.
- Nature & hiking
Grotta di San Michele (Olevano sul Tusciano)
Sant'Angelo a Fasanella
In the belly of the Alburni a cave becomes a church: stalactites, dripping water and the archangel Michael carved into the rock, between half-light and ancient silence.
- Villages
Atena Lucana
Vallo di Diano
One of the oldest towns of the Vallo di Diano, it keeps megalithic walls and a village of cobbled lanes on the acropolis, looking out over the valley and the Monti della Maddalena.
VillagesMorigerati
Cilento sud
A handful of houses looking out over the Bussento gorge, where the river surfaces again from its caves among ferns and moss, and the alleys still carry the scent of monks who came from Greece.
VillagesSicilì
Cilento sud
A hamlet perched on the slopes of Mamino, among olive trees and white figs, where in summer the brass bands fill the square and stone arches weave together silent alleys.
- Free beaches
Piscina naturale degli Iscolelli
Camerota (SA)
Pools carved into the rock with a tongue of white pebbles, reachable only after twenty minutes of path from the headland: still water, crystal clear, with not a single sign to point the way.
- Free beaches
Sorgente di Santa Caterina
Costa Infreschi
Fresh water gushing from the rock and losing itself in a patch of emerald sea, among jagged rocks reached from the coastal path.
- Villages
Scario e il porto
San Giovanni a Piro
Pastel-coloured houses climbing up from the seafront of the Golfo di Policastro, a quiet harbour from which the boats set sail for the coves of the Infreschi.
VillagesCamerota borgo
Camerota
The old town gathered beneath Monte Bulgheria, far from the sea, with its white alleys and terracotta workshops carrying on an ancient Cilento craft.
VillagesLicusati
Camerota
An inland borgo (old village) at two hundred and sixty metres, in a valley of pisciottana olive trees that yields a prized oil, with the mills still running among the stone houses.
- Nature & hiking
Postiglione, Sicignano, Petina (Alburni)
Alburni (SA)
Three villages perched beneath the limestone walls of the Alburni, the Dolomites of the South, among beech woods, karst caves and high-altitude paths that stay almost deserted.
- Free beaches
Marina di Pisciotta + borgo di Pisciotta
Pisciotta (SA)
Below the village clinging to its hill of olive trees, the fishermen still lower the menaica net, and the marina smells of the anchovies that bear its name.
- Sacred art
Abbazia della SS. Trinità + Borgo Scacciaventi
Cava de' Tirreni (SA)
Between the unbroken arcades of Borgo Scacciaventi and the thousand-year-old Benedictine abbey pressed against the rock, Cava keeps two ways of crossing time sheltered from the wind.
Nature & hikingGrotta di San Michele Arcangelo
Olevano sul Tusciano (SA)
Inside Monte Raione, a cavity seven hundred metres long hides chapels and Byzantine frescoes, where Lombard pilgrims once climbed to venerate the archangel between darkness and rock.
- Villages
'A Chiena
Campagna (SA)
In summer the river Tenza is diverted through the alleys of the old town, and Campagna becomes a village crossed by water, all bucketfuls and barefoot strolling.
VillagesRomagnano al Monte (borgo fantasma)
Romagnano al Monte (SA)
Abandoned after the 1980 earthquake, the old village hangs above the Platano gorge, its houses empty and its streets crossed by no one.
- History & archaeology
Volcei — parco urbano e museo
Buccino (SA)
Buccino stands on ancient Volcei, a Lucanian and then Roman town: among its alleys surface necropolises, mosaics and walls, gathered in the museum that tells its many pasts.
- History & archaeology
Sapri: Spigolatrice e lungomare
Sapri (SA)
On her rock along the seafront, the Spigolatrice gazes at the gulf, an echo of Mercantini's verses and of Pisacane's expedition, which landed on this beach in 1857.
- Sacred art
Battistero paleocristiano "La Rotonda"
Nocera Superiore (SA)
Circular in plan, one of the largest early Christian baptisteries in the West holds at its centre the font for immersion, beneath a double crown of ancient columns.
CastlesVilla d'Ayala
Valva (SA)
In the park of Valva, a theatre of clipped hedges holds marble busts waiting in silence, among classical statues, grottoes and a small temple lost in the ancient woods.
- Villages
Grotte del vino di Zampaglione
San Gregorio Magno (SA)
Along Via Bacco, more than six hundred grottoes carved into the rock keep wine at a constant temperature: old cells turned cellars that fill with music every late August.
- Villages
Giffoni: Film Festival + borgo Terravecchia
Giffoni Valle Piana (SA)
Every summer the young jurors of the film festival bring the town to life, while above it Terravecchia keeps watch, the medieval village with its castle and stone houses.
- History & archaeology
Roccagloriosa — area archeologica lucana
Roccagloriosa (SA)
On the ridges of the southern Cilento, the walls, houses and tombs of a Lucanian settlement of the 4th century BC resurface, kept in the village antiquarium.
- Nature & hiking
Museo Naturalistico degli Alburni
Corleto Monforte (SA)
In a village deep in the woods of the Alburni, room after room gathers thousands of birds, mammals and insects, a natural history collection grown up among the mountains of the Cilento.
- Castles
Castello e borgo
Roccadaspide (SA)
The castle looks down on the village and the Calore valley, between its towers and the stone alleys that drop towards the cultivated fields.
- Villages
Auletta — borgo antico/parco a ruderi
Auletta (SA)
The old town, frozen at the 1980 earthquake, has become a park of ruins where vegetation has taken back the collapsed houses clinging to the rocky slope.
- Nature & hiking
Acerno e cascate dell'Auso
Acerno (SA)
At seven hundred metres, in the heart of the Picentini, Acerno mirrors itself in the upper Tusciano valley: beech woods, streams and small waterfalls along the trails that make it the village of waters.
- Sacred art
Eboli: San Pietro alli Marmi e castello
Eboli (SA)
Above Eboli, the Romanesque San Pietro alli Marmi keeps its reused ancient columns, while the medieval castle watches over the Sele plain all the way to the sea.
Sacred artPolicastro Bussentino
Santa Marina (SA)
On the gulf that bears its name, the ancient Greek Pyxous keeps its medieval walls and its thirteenth-century cathedral, where the Bussento comes to meet the sea among the houses.
Sacred artBadia di Pattano (San Filadelfo)
Vallo della Lucania (SA)
A few steps from Vallo, the most intact Italo-Greek monastery in the South keeps in the chapel of San Filadelfo tenth-century Byzantine frescoes and a surviving tower.
- Nature & hiking
Moio della Civitella — sito lucano
Moio della Civitella (SA)
Among the chestnut trees of the Civitella hill emerge the massive walls of a Greek-Lucanian fortress of the 4th century BC, once a sentinel of ancient Velia.
- Villages
Cannalonga — Fiera della Frecagnola
Cannalonga (SA)
For more than five centuries, in the second week of September, the village fills with wooden stalls where boiled goat is shared out, a pastoral memory of the Cilento.
- Street art
Piano Vetrale, borgo dipinto
Orria (SA)
In the Cilento the facades of Piano Vetrale have been covered with murals since the 1980s, between scenes of peasant life and fairy tales, in the village that gave birth to the painter Paolo De Matteis.
- Street art
Rione Fornelle — Muri d'Autore
Salerno (SA)
In the ancient heart of Salerno the Fornelle quarter has been reborn with 'Muri d'Autore': verses by Alfonso Gatto and other poets turned into murals, where the street reads like a page.
- Street art
Murale di Trotula de Ruggiero di Jorit
Salerno (SA)
Along the wall of a car park in via Vinciprova, Jorit devotes an immense face to Trotula de Ruggiero, the woman doctor of the Scuola Salernitana who treated women a thousand years ago.
- Villages
Roscigno Vecchia
Roscigno (SA)
In the heart of the Cilento, the silent square of Roscigno Vecchia, with its fountain and its church, awaits inhabitants who will never return, abandoned to a landslide a century ago.
VillagesSan Severino di Centola
Centola (SA)
Perched on a spur above the Mingardo gorge, the medieval borgo (old village) of San Severino keeps watch with its tower over empty houses and alleys crumbling slowly away.
- Hiking
Ponte Tibetano di Laviano
Laviano (SA)
Ninety metres suspended over the Vallone delle Conche: on the Tibetan bridge of Laviano you walk through the void amid the woods, your gaze running all the way to the Sele valley.
- Hiking
Zipline 'Volo dell'Angelo' di Trentinara
Trentinara (SA)
Sixteen hundred metres of cable strung above the gorges of the Cilento: hooked to the Volo dell'Angelo of Trentinara, you glide toward the gulf of Salerno at the speed of the wind.
- Hiking
Zipline del Fiordo di Furore
Furore (SA)
Seven hundred metres of cable cross the fjord of Furore to Conca dei Marini: a flight of a few instants suspended between the rock walls and the blue of the coast.
HikingValle delle Ferriere
Amalfi (SA)
Above Amalfi the trail climbs a damp valley of waterfalls and prehistoric ferns, among the ruins of the old ironworks swallowed by the vegetation.
- Hiking
Sentiero dei Limoni
Maiori (SA)
An ancient route of steps and mule tracks links Maiori to Minori through the lemon terraces, the coast opening at every bend onto the sea.
HikingMonte Cervati
Piaggine (SA)
The highest peak in Campania is reached from Piaggine through beech woods and high-altitude meadows, where a cave-sanctuary opens just below the summit.
- Hiking
Gole del Calore
Felitto (SA)
Along the river Calore, near Felitto, the rock narrows into green gorges where the emerald water flows slowly, navigable by canoe beneath sheer walls.
Nature & hikingGrotte di Pertosa-Auletta (dell'Angelo)
Pertosa (SA)
You enter by boat, gliding in silence along the river Negro, before the stalactites of the Angelo open up in the dark belly of the Alburni.
Nature & hikingGrotte di Castelcivita
Castelcivita (SA)
Among the oldest prehistoric dwellings in the South, these caves burrow into the heart of the Alburni with galleries of stalagmites and chambers that the darkness stretches to infinity.
In the water & divingGrotta dello Smeraldo
Conca dei Marini (SA)
At Conca dei Marini you descend toward water that filters the light and gives it back emerald green, suspended between stalactites and a submerged presepe (nativity scene).
- Nature & hiking
Grava di Vesalo
Laurino (SA)
In the heart of the Cilento the rock splits open into a double shaft where the Silenzio stream plunges underground, realm of cavers and of an ancient darkness.
- Nature & hiking
Oasi di Persano — accesso di Altavilla Silentina
Serre (SA)
Along the bends of the Sele, among reed beds and flooded woods, an oasis where the otter survives and herons alight in the silence of dawn.
- History & archaeology
Parco Archeologico di Paestum
Capaccio-Paestum (SA)
Three Doric temples stand intact on the Sele plain, golden at sunset, Greek witnesses of a city that time has left in silence.
- Sacred art
Certosa di San Lorenzo (Padula)
Padula (SA)
One of the largest monastic complexes in Europe, with a great cloister that seems never to end and an elliptical staircase suspended in the void.
- Castles
Castello di Teggiano
Teggiano (SA)
Overlooking the Vallo di Diano, the borgo (old village) of Teggiano keeps its walls, bell towers and the Sanseverino castle, stage in the fifteenth century of the barons' conspiracy against the king of Naples.
- Sacred art
Abbazia della Ss. Trinità di Cava de' Tirreni
Cava de' Tirreni (SA)
Wedged into a rocky gorge above Cava de' Tirreni, the Benedictine abbey has prayed for over a thousand years among cloisters, catacombe (catacombs) and a library of ancient Lombard parchments.
- Sacred art
Santa Maria de' Olearia
Maiori (SA)
Carved into the rock along the coast of Maiori, the little cave abbey holds eleventh-century frescoes in the grotto where oil was once pressed: half-light, silence and Byzantium.
- Free beaches
Baia degli Infreschi
Marina di Camerota (SA)
Reachable only from the sea, among the cliffs of the Cilento the Baia degli Infreschi hides a cove of emerald water where cold freshwater springs surface among the waves.
- Free beaches
Cala Bianca
Camerota (SA)
Set among walls of white rock and Mediterranean scrub, reachable on foot or by sea, Cala Bianca offers pale pebbles and crystal-clear water in the wild heart of the Cilento.
- Free beaches
Baia del Buon Dormire
Palinuro (SA)
Reachable only from the sea, sheltered by high cliffs, the Baia del Buon Dormire owes its name to the shade that invites rest; before it, a rock shaped like a rabbit.
VillagesFurore
Furore (SA)
The village with no square: houses clinging to the rock above the famous fjord, a deep inlet carved by the torrent where the sea slips in between two sheer walls.
VillagesCastellabate
Castellabate (SA)
Looking down from on high over the Cilento sea, the borgo (old village) that enchanted the film 'Benvenuti al Sud' weaves alleys, the castle of the Abbot and sunsets that descend toward Santa Maria.
History & archaeologyMuseo Archeologico Provinciale
Salerno (SA)
Fished up from the nets in the gulf in 1930, the bronze head of Apollo watches over the halls: the emblem of a museum that gathers the archaeology of the Salerno area.
History & archaeologyMuseo della Carta
Amalfi (SA)
In an ancient thirteenth-century paper mill, in the Valle dei Mulini, hammers driven by the water of the Canneto still bring Amalfi's handmade paper to life, sheet after sheet.
History & archaeologyMuseo Vivo del Mare
Pioppi (SA)
Thirteen tanks in the sixteenth-century Palazzo Vinciprova show the life of the Cilento sea — morays, octopuses, posidonia — in the village where Ancel Keys studied the Mediterranean diet.
- History & archaeology
Museo Vivente della Dieta Mediterranea
Pioppi (SA)
In Pioppi, in the palazzo facing the sea where Ancel Keys studied the diet of the Cilento fishermen, the Mediterranean diet becomes a journey to be lived through gestures, flavours and memory.
History & archaeologyMuseo Archeologico Nazionale di Volcei
Buccino (SA)
In the ancient Augustinian convent of Buccino, the finds of ancient Volcei tell millennia of history, from the gold of a priestess to the mosaics resurfaced beneath the borgo.
History & archaeologyMuseo dello Sbarco e Salerno Capitale
Salerno (SA)
In Salerno the museum reconstructs the 1943 Allied landing and the months when the city was capital of Italy, among uniforms, vehicles and period photographs.
- Castles
Castello dell'Abate
Castellabate (SA)
Founded in 1123 by the abbot of Cava, the castello dell'Abate crowns a Cilento village overlooking the sea, among alleys and wind-swept terraces.
- Castles
Castello Macchiaroli
Teggiano (SA)
At Teggiano the Sanseverino castle, now Macchiaroli, withstood the Aragonese siege during the barons' conspiracy, still dominating the Vallo di Diano.
- Castles
Castello Angioino-Aragonese
Agropoli (SA)
On the promontory of Agropoli the Angevin-Aragonese castle closes off the old town, its towers facing the gulf and the harbour below.
CastlesCastello di Rocca Cilento
Lustra (SA)
At Rocca Cilento, above Lustra, the Sanseverino castle was the heart of the Cilento barony and still takes in hills and sea at a glance.
- Castles
Castello Giusso
Sicignano degli Alburni (SA)
At the threshold of the Alburni, the Giusso castle of Sicignano lines up its square towers above the village, where the plain meets the mountain.
VillagesTrentinara
Trentinara (SA)
Perched on the cliff gazing over the gulf as far as Capri, Trentinara is the terrace of the Cilento, from which you launch into flight above the Sele plain.
- Villages
Sant'Angelo a Fasanella
Sant'Angelo a Fasanella (SA)
Stone houses clinging to the Alburni mountains, where a church hewn into the rock opens onto the void and the mysterious Antece keeps watch from a thousand-year-old boulder.
- Views & panoramas
Torre di Punta Licosa
Castellabate (SA)
At the tip of Castellabate, where the sea turns crystalline and the scrub is fragrant with myrtle, a torre di avvistamento (watchtower) gazes at the islet bound to the myth of the siren Leucosia.
Views & panoramasTorre Normanna di Acciaroli
Pollica (SA)
In the little harbour of Acciaroli, a fishing borgo (old village) looking out over the Cilento, a medieval tower rises above the moored boats and a sea that turns turquoise in summer.
- Views & panoramas
Faro di Capo Palinuro
Centola (SA)
On the headland that bears the name of Aeneas's helmsman, the lighthouse watches over sheer cliffs and a sea that carves blue grottoes into the rock.
- Views & panoramas
Faro di Capo d'Orso
Maiori (SA)
Suspended over the Costiera between Maiori and Cetara, the lighthouse guards a rocky cape where the road climbs and the gaze runs to the mountains plunging into the sea.
Views & panoramasTorre di Velia
Ascea (SA)
On the acropolis of ancient Elea, home of the philosophers Parmenides and Zeno, a medieval tower rises among the Greek ruins and commands the plain down to the Cilento sea.
- Views & panoramas
Torre degli Infreschi
Camerota (SA)
Reachable only by sea or on foot, the tower watches over a bay near Camerota where freshwater springs surface among the rocks and the coves stay wild.
- History & archaeology
Antica città di Volcei
Buccino (SA)
At Buccino, risen on ancient Volcei, one of the twelve Lucanian towns, the urban park weaves walls, forum and Roman mosaics into the alleys of the borgo that kept them safe.
History & archaeologyArea archeologica di Fratte
Salerno (SA)
At the gates of Salerno, on the hill of Fratte, an Etruscan-Samnite settlement with its necropolis tells of the city that preceded the medieval port by centuries.
- History & archaeology
Itinerario della memoria e della pace
Campagna (SA)
At Campagna, in a former convent, a path of photographs and documents recalls the camp where Giovanni Palatucci had many Jews interned to save them from deportation.
Sacred artDuomo di Ravello
Ravello (SA)
A pulpit borne by lions and clad in golden mosaics, the bronze door and the silence of a piazza suspended above the Costiera.
- Sacred art
Duomo di Amalfi e Chiostro del Paradiso
Amalfi (SA)
Atop a long staircase the façade in shimmering bands, and beside it the Chiostro del Paradiso with its interlaced arches of Arab-Norman taste.
History & archaeologyVilla Romana di Minori
Minori (SA)
The remains of a maritime villa from the imperial age, with its frescoed nymphaeum and the garden the sea once faced, now in the heart of the town.
- Villages
Borgo di Cetara
Cetara (SA)
A fishing village that guards the colatura di alici, heir to Roman garum: nets, tuna and the majolica-tiled bell tower overlooking a small beach.
- Views & panoramas
Villa Comunale di Vietri
Vietri sul Mare (SA)
In the town of ceramics, a small public garden on the hill's edge from which the gaze runs along the whole coast as far as the Due Fratelli.
- Villages
Scala, borgo più antico della Costiera
Scala (SA)
The oldest town of the Costiera, perched opposite Ravello, made of silent hamlets, lemon terraces and paths descending toward the Valle delle Ferriere.
Free beachesBaia di Erchie
Maiori (SA)
A handful of fishermen's houses and a snug beach cradled between the headlands, with a torre saracena (Saracen watchtower) at one end: one of the most secluded coves of the Costiera.
History & archaeologyArea archeologica di Roccagloriosa
Roccagloriosa (SA)
On a height in the Cilento survive the walls of a Lucanian settlement, with the monumental tomb of an aristocratic woman and views over the Bussento valley.
History & archaeologyMuseo Archeologico di Pontecagnano
Pontecagnano Faiano (SA)
It tells of the frontier Etruscans who inhabited the Sele plain: grave goods, gold and vases from necropolises that push Etruria far further south than expected.
- Sacred art
Abbazia della Santissima Trinità
Cava de' Tirreni (SA)
Set into a wooded gorge above Cava, the Benedictine abbey founded by Sant'Alferio holds cloisters, a Lombard cemetery carved in the rock and an archive of parchments.
- Nature & hiking
Cascata Capelli di Venere
Casaletto Spartano (SA)
In the Bussento Cilento the water falls over rocks clad in maidenhair fern and moss, forming waterfalls and green pools from which it takes its name.
- Nature & hiking
Parco della Valle delle Orchidee
Sassano (SA)
In spring the slopes above Sassano light up with dozens of species of wild orchids, tiny and rare, along trails that follow the blooming.
- In the water & diving
Terme di Contursi
Contursi Terme (SA)
Along the Sele flow hot, sulphurous springs, exploited for centuries: steaming pools in the countryside where you soak under the open sky.
- Villages
Borgo di Teggiano
Teggiano (SA)
Perched over the Vallo di Diano, the borgo (old village) keeps a castle and a tangle of churches and alleys that come back to life each late summer in a medieval banquet.
- History & archaeology
Certosa e Museo di San Lorenzo — Vallo di Diano
Padula (SA)
One of the largest Carthusian monasteries in Europe, with a monumental cloister and an elliptical staircase that opens onto the Vallo di Diano like a theatre of stone.