Gardens of Augustus

After the gleaming shop windows and glamour of Capri, the Gardens of Augustus, towards the top of the island, are a retreat into a natural paradise, complete with unforgettable panoramas. The garden's tranquility and natural beauty is nothing if not therapy.

From the vantage point of the Gardens, apart from the splendid views of the sea, are fantastic photographic vistas. 

To one side the undulating roofs and picturesque bell tower of the St. James' Certosa (Charterhouse), a Carthusian Monastery, lie in the foreground below the Gardens.

Ahead, the Faraglioni rocks rise from the blue of the Tyrrhenian Sea.

To the other side, a narrow road zigzags dramatically in hairpin bends down Capri's cliff reaching the harbor of Marina Piccola below.

This fantastic feat of engineering is known as Via Krupp, named after a German steel magnate, Friedrich Alfred Krupp, who, in the early nineteen hundreds, came to Capri to convalesce after an illness, and later commissioned both the Gardens of Augustus and the road that takes his name. Via Krupp, however, is not always open because of the possibility of falling rocks.

The gardens themselves are laid out on a series of colorful terraces filled with an abundance of flora found on the island. Each affords a unique and fantastic view from their lofty vantage point. On one of the terraces is a Stele (a commemoration stone) by Giacomo Manzù to Lenin, who visited the Island and stayed there in 1908.

Capri, in a myriad of ways is a dream destination, becoming more beautiful the higher up the mountain one goes.