Trekking on the Amalfi Coast: from Maiori to Montepiano via San Vito and Badia

Place of Departure: Maiori

Place of Arrival: Montepiano

Walking time: 3 hours approx

Degree of difficulty: easy

From Via Casale Alto in Maiori, take the steps up.

At the beginning the path is quite steep but it gets fairly flat toward the end when you reach San Vito.

From San Vito you turn right to Scalese, where you can quench you thirst at a cool fountain.. Here the path joins an old pedestrian road that led to Salerno.

The wide and comfortable path passes a place known as “int lauro”, runs through the valley of the abbey of Santa Maria de Olearia, through a pine forest until reaching the top ridge of Monte Capo d'Orso.

From here the view extends from one side over the whole Amalficoast to Punta Campanella and the island of Capri and on the other side to the Gulf of Salerno.

Along the way you may meet people bent under the weight of the heavy baskets full of the lemons they are taking down these steps from the surrounding gardens.

From San Vito turn right Added to the beauty of the landscape is also the rich and variegated fauna. Along with the common fox, we can find weasels, stone martens, and badgers. The highest peaks and indentations along the rocky ridge have been colonized by numerous species of bird.

The promontory is an excellent landing area for the migratory streams that pass up and down the country. Flocks of cranes and other waders can be seen crossing the sky in noisy but orderly flight. Ravens, magpies, jackdaws, kestrels, buzzards and other birds of prey, the most important being the peregrine, are permanent visitors.

Erosion of the rocks in Montepiano has been extensive and quite extraordinary. The combined effect of water and wind created an almost continuous series of hollows, gorges, peaks and pinnacles, some of which have unusual or imaginative shapes such as the famous "Man on Horseback" which resembles the landscape of the Dolomites on a smaller scale.