Category: coastal

trip report by site editor Rick McCharles

aka Path of the Gods and Walk of the Gods

Agerola to Positano, 2 ½ to 3 hours

In Naples I couldn’t find a copy of Lonely Planet Hiking Italy. … Instead, I jotted down some trail notes from the internet. And jumped on a bus to “Amalfi”.

I jumped off the bus upon seeing a sign for “Sentiero degli Dei“ (Pathway of the Gods).

Where was I? … Piazza Paolo Capassa, the sign said. A tourist information office in that plaza gave me a crude map. I was set.

Here’s the start from that trailhead.

It wandered through vineyards.

Though the ancient trail has been improved much over the centuries, I’d still call it a “difficult” hike.

I left a Summit Stone atop this tombstone pillar, under a sign posted by the Club of Italian Alpinists.

Approaching Positano, the cliffs got steeper and steeper.

I saw about a dozen other hikers on a perfect day in October. All spoke either English or German.

SAY WHAT … !!

My legs were wobbly by the time I got to the bottom, finally arriving in Positano.

The most dangerous section of the Path of the Gods, by far, is walking narrow roadways from the Positano trailhead up to the excellent Brikette hostel.

La vita è bella.

The Path of the Gods is one of the best hikes in the world.

See the rest of my photos. Or watch a short video of the hike.

Daniel linked to a number of awesome options:

The South West Coast Path
The Cleveland Way
The Norfolk Coast Path
Fife Coastal Path
Arran Coastal Way
Ayrshire Coastal Path
Causeway Coast Way
Lecale Way

But his personal pick for best U.K. coastal hike is the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path.

Andy’s added another on CheapTents.com:

Anglesey Coastal Path Walk

The Anglesey Coastal walk measures in at around 125 miles in total, though handily there are 20 towns/villages located directly on the route. This means taking on just part of the walk is easily done, making this walk accessible to most levels of walker at some point. Overall it took us 8 days walking to complete the full distance, plus one more day we spent in one of the villages on the route – from the information I can find it can take anywhere from 5 days to 2 weeks to complete the full distance.

We started walking from the Roman Fort (which encircles St Cybi’s Church in Holyhead), this is also the end point of the full circular walk. On the walk we saw some spectacular scenery, there is some really quite cool wildlife including; puffins, guillemots, seals and even the odd dolphin! as well as beautiful Anglesey coast line.

… read more

I’m ruminating on a series of hikes for this Fall:

Cinque Terre in northern Italy → Corsica → Sardinia → Sicily → …

I’d take ferries from one to the next, I assume.

Leave a comment if you have any advice for me. I’ve never hiked this region before.