Hotel Tramonto d'Oro

Hotel Tramonto d'Oro began in 1952 as a café: Donato Esposito and his sister Carmelina opened the Bar Tramonto d'Oro, the Golden Sunset Café, in Praiano. A restaurant followed, then rooms, completed in 1963, and the Esposito family still runs the four-star hotel today, with Domenico Esposito, a grandson of the founders, cooking in its restaurant. It sits on the sea side of the SS163, beside the majolica dome of the church of San Gennaro, with the drop to the sea below.

The rooms are bright and Mediterranean, with Vietri ceramics, and they are compact. The Superior with a partial sea view is 20 m², with a 4 m² balcony. The Classic rooms are 24 m², with a 13 m² terrace over the sea, set with a table and sun loungers. The Deluxe Mediterranean rooms have hand-painted Vietri tiled floors and a 5 m² sea-view balcony, and the Junior Suite has an 11 m² terrace. New in 2026, in a building next door, are Deluxe rooms with a private outdoor Jacuzzi on a sea-view terrace. The Apartment Suite Melina, 50 m² with its own entrance and kitchen, is a few steps away.

What it is chosen for is the direction it faces. Praiano looks west along the coast, so from the rooftop pool and the terrace the view runs across the water to Positano, the Li Galli islands and the Faraglioni of Capri. In early summer the sun goes down behind the mountains above Positano, a good half hour before the official sunset, and the sea and the town turn gold; in the last days of October it sets behind Capri. After dark, Positano lights up across the bay. The pool, which the hotel counts among the largest on the coast, is open from May to October, from 8am to 8pm, with a café on the roof for lunch, drinks and the sunset aperitivo. Breakfast is served on the terrace, and dinner in the restaurant, from 7pm, also looks out to sea. A sauna, a Turkish bath and a Technogym gym complete it.

The trade is space and the beach. Rooms are small for the price, and the cheaper ones see the sea only in part or not at all. There is no beach of its own: Gavitella's pebbles and beach clubs are below the hotel down steep steps, and Marina di Praia is a short drive. Parking is free, with valet, and the SITA buses stop at the door. Book it for the sunset from the pool, a family welcome and the bus to Positano and Amalfi from the gate, in a quieter village than either.