Circolo dei Forestieri

For a fraying-at-the-edges window into that exalted era of the 19th-century grand tour, pop into Sorrento’s “Foreigner’s Club” bar, home to the town tourist office and still patronized largely by English-speaking tourists for one very good reason: the view. Skip the unmemorable food and head for a terrace table to sip a cocktail and watch the sun set over the wide sweep of the Bay of Naples below, the lights of Naples slowly coming on to illuminate the far coastline beneath the mighty, dark bulk of Mount Vesuvius.