Why Skipping Naples and the Coast Would Be Your Biggest Italy Mistake

Naples gets an unfair reputation. People say they will go one day, but often mean after they have been everywhere else first. Serena Criscuolo, who lives in the city, has a different view.

Serena lives in Naples and advises travellers through The Voyage Co.

Which island in the Bay of Naples do most visitors never take the ferry to?

We asked Serena about the place in the region that visitors most consistently overlook.

Procida. It sits in the Bay of Naples alongside Ischia and Capri, far smaller and far less visited than either, and that is exactly the point. Procida is still a working fishermen's island, with a harbour full of painted boats, a tangle of pastel houses climbing up from the waterfront, and a pace of life that has remained more or less unchanged for generations. It was named Italy's Capital of Culture in 2022, which brought it a brief moment of wider attention, but it has not been swept up into the kind of resort development that has changed the character of more famous places in the bay.

Serena says it is the island she would take any visitor who wants to see what the Bay of Naples actually was before the tourist economy arrived. Take the ferry from Naples and give it a full day.

The most famous place on the Amalfi Coast that is not worth the detour

We asked Serena where the expectation and the reality do not match up.

Ravello, on the Amalfi Coast. It is small, expensive, and sits quite isolated up in the hills above the coast. The views from the terraces are spectacular, and she will not deny that, but it has become a place that exists primarily to host weddings and classical music festivals. Most visitors arrive, photograph the views, and leave without having had much of an experience beyond the photograph. If you have limited time on the Amalfi Coast, the effort-to-reward ratio is not in Ravello's favour. Spend the time in Positano or Amalfi town instead, where there is more to actually do and eat.

How to spend 48 hours in Naples and Campania

We asked Serena to plan two days for a first-time visitor.

She would start with Naples itself, and she would start there because Naples is where the whole region begins to make sense. The city explains the food, the pace, the energy, and the relationship with history that you carry with you for everything that comes after. Give it a full first day: walk the historic centre (a UNESCO World Heritage site), eat pizza for lunch, let the Spaccanapoli quarter and the Baroque churches and the street life take you somewhere unexpected. Do not over-plan the Naples day. The city works best when you leave gaps in the itinerary.

On day two, the choice is yours: Capri for the most iconic scenery in the bay, Sorrento and the Amalfi Coast for the classic cliff-road-and-lemon southern Italy experience, or a quieter ferry to Procida for something that feels genuinely different. What Serena would resist is cutting Naples short to get to any of these places faster. The city comes first.

The mistake most visitors make in this region

We asked Serena what she sees most often.

Not visiting Naples at all. The stories about the city being unsafe or chaotic or difficult to navigate circulate widely and stick. In Serena's experience, and in the experience of most visitors who actually go, it is something quite different. The city is alive, generous with visitors who come in good faith, and it offers a kind of energy that no amount of time on the Amalfi Coast can replicate. Go to Naples first. You will not regret it.

When is the best time of year to visit Naples?

We asked Serena when she would personally recommend coming.

She does not have a single recommendation because she means it when she says all seasons are wonderful. Christmas in Naples is one of the great seasonal experiences in Italy: the presepe (Nativity scene) tradition is extraordinarily deep-rooted, the pastry shops are at their best, and the city has an energy that is both festive and unmistakably Neapolitan. Summer is best for the coast and the islands. Spring and autumn are the most comfortable for the city itself. There is genuinely no bad time.

What to eat in Naples

We asked Serena for the food experience visitors should not miss.

Pizza. She says it the way someone says the obvious thing that everyone needs to be reminded of, because the obvious thing is also the true thing. Naples is the birthplace of pizza Margherita, the city where the form was invented and where it is still made with an instinctive knowledge that you cannot replicate simply by following a recipe. Eat it at a proper Neapolitan pizzeria, not a tourist-facing place on the waterfront. The crust should be chewy and slightly charred at the edges, the tomato sauce should taste like it came off a vine that morning, and the fior di latte should melt rather than slide. If you eat pizza anywhere else in the world and then eat it in Naples, you understand immediately why the city is so possessive about it.

Naples doesn't ask for your approval, it asks for your attention. Give it the first day of your Campania trip, eat the pizza where you can hear the city, take the ferry to Procida instead of Capri, and the rest of the region will make far more sense for it.

Explore more Naples insights and Amalfi Coast insights to plan your next trip with locals.