Ancestry and Aglianico in the Amalfi Coast

Last spring I had the great fortune of being a guest at the luxurious Il San Pietro di Positano Hotel on the Amalfi Coast.

View from the balcony at Il San Pietro di Positano

Each town along the coast attracts a diverse melange of visitors, from Julia Roberts and Robert Di Niro who were former guests at Il San Pietro, to locals from the port cities of Naples and Salerno who buzz around on cliff's edge on Vespas rushing to relax in Ravello or Sorrento.

My luxurious stay on the Amalfi Coast was a far cry from my ancestry I was digging for in the region. My grandfather, who immigrated to New York from the region roughly a hundred years ago, was from a small town between 2 of southern Italy's most beautiful places, Positano and Matera. At the time of his embarkation life was destitute and millions of residents had no choice but to abandon their beautiful land.  Now the area is one of most popular tourist destinations in the world.

Hand painted ceramics from the Solimene factory in the town of Vietri on the Amalfi Coast

Check out my recent article in Encompass magazine published by the AAA for my story on discovering my roots in southern Italy and the lure of the region for today's variety of wayfarers. - article link

Check out also a list of things do to on the Amalfi Coast that I researched for Hosted Villas published in A Luxury Travel Blog - article link

Ripe produce in the Campania countryside. The region is famous for San Marzano tomatoes, Aglianico wine and bufala
mozzarella.