Capri

Exit the Piazzetta down Via Vittorio Emanuele past the Quisisana, then turn onto Via Camerelle and the boutique-lined Via Tragara — 20 minutes of bougainvillea and pastel facades before the path opens onto Belvedere di Tragara, the sea-level shot of the Faraglioni sea stacks (morning sun lights them from the east, water at maximum electric blue). Loop back via the small road to the Gardens of Augustus for the counterpoint: the same three rocks from above, with Via Krupp's serpentine staircase corkscrewing 100 m down the cliff at your feet.

Tip: Via Krupp itself has been closed for rockfalls since 2014 — photograph from above, don't try the gate. Inside the gardens, walk past the main belvedere where every cruise group lines up and continue to the small terrace at the southern end: identical Faraglioni view, half the people. The €1.50 entry is cash only.

Walk back up Via Vittorio Emanuele — 8 minutes uphill, you'll smell the frying pastry a block before you see the storefront. Buonocore has been pressing caprese panini and frying sfogliatelle through this same window since 1971; the queue is constant but moves in three minutes. Take everything to go and walk two minutes to the cool stone steps of the Certosa di San Giacomo — Capri Town's only genuinely quiet bench, a free belvedere over the Faraglioni from yet another angle.

Tip: Order the caprese panino (€8 — Sorrento mozzarella, sun-dried tomato, basil on warm focaccia) and one sfogliatella riccia (€2.50 — ask for it warm, ricotta version not custard). Skip every sit-down place on Via Camerelle: the same panino on a tablecloth costs €22 and won't taste any better.

From Piazzale Cerio catch the orange ATC bus to Anacapri (15 min, €2, departures every 20 min), get off at Piazza Vittoria and walk 100 m to the chairlift base. The 13-minute open-air ride lifts you alone in a single seat over lemon orchards and whitewashed roofs to the island's 589 m summit, where the entire Bay of Naples opens out — Vesuvius across the water, Sorrento Peninsula curling east, the Faraglioni 600 m straight below your feet. Afternoon haze has burned off by now and visibility is at its sharpest.

Tip: Sit on the right side going up for the full bay panorama. At the summit, skip the bar's jammed terrace — walk 5 minutes behind it on the marked dirt path to the ruined hermitage of Santa Maria a Cetrella, the only spot on the island where you see the Faraglioni from above. Chairlift is €14 return, runs continuously 09:30-17:00; the last descent is 16:30 sharp — set an alarm or you walk down the mountain.

From Piazza Vittoria walk up Via Capodimonte — 7 minutes through residential Anacapri, past lemon trees and a stone-arched lane that opens onto the gates of Villa San Michele. You're skipping the interior; the magic is on the public terrace at Piazzetta San Michele, where Axel Munthe's marble columns frame Vesuvius and the Bay of Naples as the western sun lights everything orange. Stay the full hour — the colour temperature shifts every ten minutes from gold to copper to rose.

Tip: The €12 museum ticket buys access to Munthe's interior and the sphinx — but the famous 'columns over the bay' photograph is taken from the public Piazzetta San Michele next door, which is free and open until dusk. Arrive by 17:00 to catch the angle when light rakes the columns from the west; by 17:45 the columns are silhouetted and you've missed the shot.

Walk down Via Capodimonte and turn right onto Via Giuseppe Orlandi — 5 minutes through Anacapri's residential heart and you reach Materita, a vine-shaded courtyard of twelve tables where the Cacace family has cooked since 1986. This is the place Anacapresi come for proper Caprese cooking — the dishes Marina Piccola tourist traps charge triple for and serve frozen. Sunset filters through the lemon leaves above your table while you eat; the rhythm is unhurried, the bill is honest.

Tip: Order the ravioli capresi (€14 — fresh ricotta, marjoram, in a tomato sauce simmered four hours) and the pezzogna all'acqua pazza (€26 — local sea bream poached in tomato-garlic-caper broth). Reserve the day before by phone; the courtyard is small and walk-ins get the indoor tables. PITFALL: Never eat on Capri's Piazzetta or at Marina Piccola — €40 spaghetti and views of other tourists; one Marina Piccola lounge famously charges €30 just to sit on a sunbed. Anacapri's prices stay honest because locals still eat here. If catching the last ferry to Naples or Sorrento same-day, confirm departure at the port that morning — last fast ferry is typically 19:30 in summer, 18:00 off-season.

From the Piazzetta, head down Via Vittorio Emanuele past the Quisisana hotel — six minutes of cypress-shaded descent before a stone gate opens into a 14th-century Carthusian monastery hidden between two cliffs. The two cloisters are silent at this hour; almost no one finds their way here, leaving you alone with bougainvillea, Roman statues from the Blue Grotto, and a back terrace that hangs straight over the southern sea.

Tip: Closed Mondays — open Tue-Sun 10:00-14:00 only, so this is the one window. Walk through to the rear garden (Parco Filosofico) for the head-on Faraglioni view that Gardens of Augustus visitors don't realize exists.

Climb back up Via Vittorio Emanuele and turn left onto Via Lo Palazzo — five minutes uphill to a vine-covered terrace looking down on Marina Grande bay. A family kitchen running for three generations: order the ravioli capresi (€16), pillows of caciotta and marjoram in fresh tomato that were invented on this island, and the totani e patate (€18), a squid-and-potato stew that tastes of the rocks below.

Tip: Ask explicitly for 'la terrazza' when you sit down — the indoor room has no view. Arrive by 12:30 sharp; by 13:30 the small terrace is full and they stop seating walk-ins for the next two hours.

From Verginiello walk south down Via Vittorio Emanuele then Via Camerelle — eight minutes through Capri's chic shopping spine, all Prada and lemon-print linens. The terraced gardens cascade over the cliff: Faraglioni rising from cobalt water on the left, the white zigzag of Via Krupp carved into the rock below on the right. Afternoon light strikes from the west — this is the postcard angle that has sold Capri for a hundred years.

Tip: Stand on the lower-left terrace for the framed Faraglioni-with-Krupp-switchbacks shot — the upper terrace looks like every Instagram photo. Via Krupp itself is gated due to rockfall; ignore guides offering 'private access', it's permanently closed.

Walk Via Matteotti and Via Tragara — fifteen minutes along Capri's most elegant lane, villa walls dripping with bougainvillea, the scent of jasmine pressing down from above. The clifftop terrace at the end delivers the closest, most cinematic head-on view of the Faraglioni: three sea stacks lifting out of the water like a sculpture. From 17:30 the western light turns them gold; by 18:30 they glow rust-orange.

Tip: If your legs feel strong, descend the 300 stone steps below Tragara to Da Luigi ai Faraglioni at sea level for an Aperol Spritz against the rock arch — but the climb back up takes 25 minutes of straight stairs and there is no taxi alternative.

Twelve minutes back along Via Camerelle, now lit by shop windows, brings you to Via Fuorlovado and a hundred-year-old Capri institution. The 'Pizza all'Acqua' (€22) — thin, blistered, mozzarella and a streak of pepperoncino — is the dish even Sorrento locals ferry over for. The grilled catch of the day (€38, priced by weight) arrives whole, deboned tableside, with nothing but lemon and Anacapri olive oil.

Tip: Reserve a day ahead for a table on Via Fuorlovado, not the inner room — say 'tavolo esterno'. Pitfall warning for Capri Town: avoid every restaurant whose tables physically sit on the Piazzetta — they add €8 per person 'service' on top of inflated prices, and the food is the worst on the island.