There are places in Rome you visit, and then there is the Vatican, which you are briefly allowed inside. The smallest country in the world sits on a hill across the Tiber, barely a hundred acres of it, and yet…
Archives for July 2026
3 Days in Rome: A Perfect Itinerary
Three days is the sweet spot for a first visit to Rome. It is long enough to stand inside the ancient city, cross the river to the Vatican, and still leave an afternoon for gardens and quiet corners, without the…
Victoria’s Complete Guide to Rome
Rome is not a city you see so much as one you step into. Almost three thousand years of it are stacked one layer on the next, a temple beneath a church beneath an apartment block, an emperor’s racetrack that…
Rome – The Long Way In
The train ran north out of Naples through the middle of the afternoon, and I watched the coast give way to hills, and the hills flatten into the long, golden plain that finally becomes Rome. I had just spent days…
Naples – The City That Lets You Stay
I woke in Naples before I meant to. The shutters were still open from the night before. I had left them that way on purpose, too greedy for the city to close it out, and so the morning came in…
Naples – The City That Arrives All at Once
Naples does not ease you in. I came in by train, and the city started before I had even left the platform. The carriage doors opened onto heat and noise and a river of people already moving, and I stepped…
Victoria’s Complete Guide to Naples
I arrived in Naples on a train so red it looked like a provocation. The Frecciarossa pulled into Napoli Centrale in the middle of the afternoon, and the city hit me the way it always hits people who don’t know…
The Blue of Capri
There is a version of Capri that disappears every morning. Most people never meet her. They arrive with the first ferries carrying cameras, linen hats, reservations, and plans. They inherit an island already awake, already performing itself, already smiling for…
Under the Same Sky
The invitations arrived two days earlier. A friend of a friend had invited us onto a yacht off the Amalfi Coast. There would be dinner. Music. Fireworks after sunset. I almost declined. There is something about celebrations that can make…
The Pink Beach Club
The beach clubs in Maiori are not all the same color. This was the first thing I noticed, arriving the evening before, watching the coastline settle into dusk from the window of a taxi that had taken longer than it…
Victoria’s Complete Guide to Amalfi
Amalfi There is a particular confusion that afflicts most visitors to this part of Italy. They say they are going to the Amalfi Coast. They book a hotel in Positano, take photographs from a terrace above the sea, eat a…
Victoria’s Complete Guide to Maiori and Minori
The Eastern Shore: Where the Amalfi Coast Stops Performing The road east from Amalfi tells you immediately that something is about to change. The cliff face loosens its grip on the sea. The terraced lemon groves flatten into something more…
