Not really instagrammable: Ischia seems to have fallen out of time, but that’s exactly what makes the island so endearing.
Photo: Barbara Russ
The Italian island of Ischia is considered a pensioners’ paradise. Our author resisted going there with her parents for a long time. In the end she traveled with us – and had to realize: There is nowhere better to relax.
Ischia – my parents and aunts have been going there almost every year for ages. You are in good company, and Angela Merkel also likes to vacation on the island. For a long time my parents begged me to finally come along. But Italy, the country of my first holiday memories in general, and Ischia in particular, this island of pensioners, didn’t interest me one iota for years. I wanted to go to Thailand, the United States and Japan. The main thing is far away. Then Corona came and long-distance travel was no longer easily possible. Italy suddenly seemed like a good idea. And the remaining time with the parents is by no means certain either, so I decided to endure it with the help of Aperol Spritz. Off to Ischia!
Getting to Ischia is not complicated, but exhausting. Before Corona, there were direct flights to Naples from almost every major German city. Now I have to change trains in Munich. From the airport in Naples you can take a taxi or an “Alibus” to the port of Molo Beverello and pull your suitcase onto the ferry, which takes vacationers to Ischia Porto in a good hour. My family takes the night bus from Munich, “because the loungers are so comfortable,” says my mother. “You wake up in the morning and get on the ferry.”