After a wonderful time in Cosenza with the Spagnuolo family, we headed up to the Amalfi coast to the small town of Scala, perched on the side of a mountain along the maritime district south of Naples (Napoli). Jeanne had booked us to stay in a Monastery that she had found out about from a book she acquired called “Staying in Monastery’s in Italy”, mysteriously enough. We found the village after an hour along a very windy, skinny, and busy road that skirted the coast along mountain cliffs. There were gazillions of motorcycles tempting fate, racing along the thin road between the cars.

At the Monastery, we were greeted by the nuns in charge. They directed us to the “apartment” down the street that we stayed in for the evening. This was all done in Italian, which JimD did a good job with as our translator. The apartment slept 6, and included a nice kitchen with views over the mountains and sea.

That evening we walked up the hill to the Trattoria de Lorenzo. It had an outdoor patio with incredible views of the mountains down to the sea. Lorenzo greeted us and was very excited to have us there! After introductions over some of his own local white wine, we skipped the menus and put our faith in Lorenzo to “take care of us”. This started with several plates of antipasto including all kinds of fish, squid, and zucchini dumplings. Then home-made pasta with “frutti de mer” (fruits of the sea), with different kinds of clams, and mussels, and shrimps. And finally, for the second course they grilled us three lovely fresh fish in olive oil. It was molto bene! We all concluded, including Dominick and Benjamin that it rated as was one of the best seafood meals of our lives.