Introduction to Ravello

275km (171 miles) SE of Rome, 66km (41 miles) SE of Naples, 29km (18 miles) W of Salerno

Ravello is one of the loveliest resorts along the Amalfi Drive. It has attracted artists, writers, and celebrities for years (Richard Wagner, Greta Garbo, André Gide, and even D. H. Lawrence, who wrote Lady Chatterley's Lover here). Ravello's reigning celebrity for many years was Gore Vidal, who purchased a villa here as a writing retreat (he recently sold it). William Styron set his novel Set This House on Fire here. Boccaccio dedicated part of the Decameron to Ravello, and John Huston used it as a location for his film Beat the Devil, with Bogie.

The sleepy village seems to hang 335m (1,100 ft.) up, between the Tyrrhenian Sea and some celestial orbit. You approach from Amalfi, 6km (3 3/4 miles) southwest, by a wickedly curving road cutting through the villa- and vine-draped hills that hem in the Valley of the Dragon.