The trip
Overview
South of Rome, Italy changes register — louder, warmer, better fed — and this route is for travellers who have already done the Rome–Florence–Venice triangle and want the country's deeper south. It opens with four nights on the Amalfi Coast, where villages stack themselves vertically between lemon terraces and the sea, then crosses the peninsula to Puglia for five nights among whitewashed hill towns, cone-roofed trulli and fortified farmhouse hotels called masserie.
The two halves complement rather than repeat. Amalfi is drama: cliff roads, Positano's cascade of colour, boat days to grottoes and, for those who want it, Capri. Puglia is texture: Ostuni's white lanes, Alberobello's trulli, orecchiette made by hand in Bari's old town doorways, and a coastline of small rocky coves rather than grand set pieces. Food is the thread — arguably Italy's best regional eating, at prices the north forgot decades ago.
Flights from the UAE work via Rome or direct where seasonal routes serve Naples; home from Bari or Brindisi keeps the map moving forward. A car with driver on the Amalfi stretch spares you the coast road's hairpins; in Puglia a self-drive hire car suits the flat, easy distances.
Highlights
- ✦Four nights based in Positano, Amalfi or above it all in Ravello
- ✦Private boat day along the coast with swim stops and a Capri option
- ✦Ravello's cliff-edge gardens at Villa Rufolo and Villa Cimbrone
- ✦Five nights in a converted masseria among olive groves
- ✦Alberobello's trulli and the white city of Ostuni
- ✦Hands-on orecchiette session or a Puglian home-cooking lunch
Who it suits
- ●Repeat Italy travellers ready to go beyond the classic triangle
- ●Couples for whom dinner is the day's main event
- ●Honeymooners wanting glamour first and rustic quiet second
Why this journey works
- ✓Two contrasting souths in one trip — spectacle, then substance
- ✓Driver on the hairpins, self-drive on the plains: the right tool for each half
- ✓Puglia's prices subsidise the Amalfi Coast's
- ✓Open-jaw routing in via Naples, out via Bari wastes nothing
Day by day
Days 1–4
The Amalfi Coast — vertical Italy
Fly in via Naples or Rome and let a driver handle the coast road while you handle the views. Four nights in Positano for glamour, Amalfi town for walkability, or Ravello for altitude and quiet. The private boat day is the trip's hinge — the coast was built to be seen from the water — with swim stops, a grotto or two and lunch in a cove restaurant reachable only by sea. Add Ravello's gardens, the Path of the Gods walk for the energetic, and lemon-scented evenings that go on properly late.
Day 5
Across the peninsula
A half-day transfer east across the mountains into Puglia — around three hours, broken if you like at Matera just over the Basilicata border, where cave dwellings older than most countries climb a ravine. Collect the hire car and roll into your masseria by evening: thick white walls, olive groves, a pool in the old walled garden and dinner from the farm's own produce.
Days 6–10
Puglia — white towns and slow food
Five nights, one base, easy spokes. Alberobello's trulli are best at nine in the morning; Ostuni and Locorotondo fill lazy afternoons; Polignano a Mare provides the cliff-dive drama and a gelato on the old-town balcony. A cooking session — orecchiette by hand, or lunch in a signora's courtyard — anchors one day; a swim along the rocky coves of the Adriatic anchors several more. Dinners rotate between the masseria and village osterie where the bill stays reliably southern.
Day 11
Home from Puglia
Drop the car at Bari or Brindisi and fly home to the UAE via a short European connection, arriving the same evening.
When to go
May, June, September and early October are ideal — warm seas, open beach clubs, walkable middays. July and August bring heat and the Italian holiday crowds, felt most sharply on the Amalfi roads; April is lovely but the water is brisk. Many coastal businesses close from November to March, so this is firmly a warm-season route.
Planning around seasons, regions and style? Read the full Italy destination guide →
What’s included
- ✓Flights from Dubai or Abu Dhabi into Naples or Rome, home from Bari or Brindisi
- ✓Private transfers on the Amalfi Coast and a hire car in Puglia
- ✓Ten nights' accommodation as described
- ✓Daily breakfast
- ✓Private boat charter day on the Amalfi Coast
- ✓PCT travel consultant support before and during travel
Not included
- —Travel insurance
- —City tourist taxes payable locally
- —Meals not stated
- —Fuel and tolls for the hire car
- —Personal spending
Ways to extend it
- +Add two nights in Matera's cave-hotel district
- +Begin with three nights in Rome
- +Include a Gargano peninsula detour for the quietest beaches
Gallery
