Island hopping in Ponza, Ischia, Procida, and Elba (plus my rankings)

Napoli Notizie # 13

*Last week, I accidentally sent out my weekly post in draft format with tons of errors, incomplete sentences, and random thoughts 🫢

I went into a shame spiral for 1-2 minutes, then used my mindfulness techniques to STOP and remember that I’m only human. I am reposting the finished version below*

I can’t believe it’s June 1st! The heat is slowly creeping up and up, but the “oven” of humidity has yet to be in full blast. I am still able to do my usual walks around town without fear of fainting. I only hope it lasts through June.

I had a particularly glamorous May. I visited Ponza, Ischia, Procida, and Elba islands - which makes four Italian islands in one month. A personal record. I will be ranking them, from my favorite to my least favorite, where the favorite scale is “I feel like Beyonce” and the last favorite is “top ten day in my life”. My balls-out summer, where the future is none of my business and I’m ripping tomatoes daily, started off pretty strong.

#1 Ponza (7.3 square kilometers)

Ponza is much smaller than Ischia, but what it lacks in size, it makes up for in charm. What happened to us on Ponza is a real island story of small-town living. We drove from Naples to Formia early in the morning, as the ferries don’t yet go directly from Naples until June. We packed only a backpack, since we were renting scooters on the island and needed to fit everything onto the scooter to get to our Airbnb. It was a long, two-and-a-half-hour journey, but as soon as we stepped off the ferry, I knew we had made the right choice. There were hardly any tourists around. Unbelievably, despite the seventy-five-degree sunny days, this was considered off-season.

Our scooters were waiting for us next to the port, we jumped on and drove to the northern part of the island to meet up with our Airbnb host, Alfredo. Driving a scooter on these tiny roads, where the curves hug the coast and the traffic is sparse, is so exhilarating! We made it to the meet-up spot, which happened to be in front of a supermarket, so we grabbed some provisions for the weekend. I started chatting to the nonna who owned the supermarket, and right away, she got to work on her connections. She then asked us about the new American pope, asked if my sister and I were twins, and introduced us to two of her seven children, one of whom worked at the grocery store with her and another who popped by on his way to work. I just love these Italian nonne who are so stern but also so welcoming, demanding we follow her rules and eat our lunch at the market patio. Eventually, after she waved us off like we were leaving on the Titanic, we made it to our amazing Airbnb with a view of the ocean.