Villaggio Santafortunata Campogaio

Rented one of the “Small homes” that sleeps 3 with my son. 1 single bed and a set of bunk beds. A really cold fridge and its own bathroom. Shower had several different functions including overhead rain, separate shower head and mid body blasters. The shower had seen better days but did the job. Always plenty of hot water. They give you waffle sheets as towels and what I thought were pillowcase’s initially, turned out to be the hand towels. No bath mat so we sacrificed one of the hand towels to prevent slippage. There is a little picnic table and a chair on your own little deck. Sat outside to read the first night and got eaten alive by bugs. Only has one power outlet. Hairdryer can be used for short blasts as it gets really hot to hold. The air con is marvellous. Went to the pool. You have to wear a swimming cap. They sell them at the bar for €2.50 or they actually have a stash at the side of the pool that people have left behind. Unless you are bald, the lifeguard is very strict about hat wearing. The only way into town is by bus. Either the dedicated shuttle or the standard 008 bus. The shuttle is €2 per person per journey in cash, tickets purchased at reception. The bus is €1.50 but you have to get tickets either from the tabac or sometimes onboard. Not all buses had a tap and go system so it’s a bit hit and miss. The shuttle runs every half hour on a first come first served basis. You can’t buy a return so if there’s a massive queue for the return, you either take your chance and hope you can get on (last shuttle is 00:10), hope there’s a later bus or it’ll be a taxi setting you back €25+. There is a shop on site selling the basics and not too inflated. Also tried the takeaway pizza from the restaurant which was really good and affordable. The restaurant looked lovely but was a bit pricey. Good views over the bay. Ants will be in your room. Your shower. Your luggage! Keep food mess to a minimum and it’s fine. The beach is just rocks. To the left it’s sunbeds ranging from €10-30 depending on where you sit, with umbrella for the day. You enter the water which is pretty choppy down metal stairs. Beach shoes advised. Life guard on patrol. Beach bar for drinks. Toilets and showers. On the free side there is nothing. No shade. Just bare rock. Strong swimmers only really. Oh and a million stairs down so unsuitable for anyone unsteady on the feet or kids. Bonus is that it’s a hell of a lot quieter than the pool!

Overall it was a nice stay, we booked a superior bungalow with a sea view, I think we probably had one of the better views from the whole campsite. The views were stunning, Sorrento town on the right, the sea and mount vesiuvis in front. It was beautiful. Breakfast was pretty good. Didn’t have dinner inside restaurant but did get pizza takeaway one night which was pretty good. The shop onsite was massively overpriced, prices are equivalent to plane food prices. I bought 1 tomato from the shop and it was bout €3. The following day I went to Sorrento town where I bought 600g of tomatoes for €1.20. Charging people for salt and pepper is a bit ridiculous in my opinion. We then decided to go to the pool and we were shocked to learn that we had to use a swimming cap for our hair…if we didn’t have one we had to pay €2.50 for one. We didn’t take cash or card to the pool because we didn’t think we had to use money there and 2 we just wanted to chill without worrying about our money in the bag. I went to the reception and asked why do I need to wear a swimming cap in the pool, I was told it’s a standard hygiene practise…yet…the swimming pool had green stuff around it. I have been on a lot of holidays and I never had to wear a swimming cap in a pool that’s in the hotel. Anyways I was told it’s because of hair, I said that people have hair on their face, arms, legs, private parts…I was told I could just use the ‘spare caps’ which I replied that we weren’t told about that and the receptionist looked shocked and started huffing and puffing and rang the person at the pool and he never answered, I left because it was pointless. Clearly just a money grab. Then the shuttle, €2 isn’t too bad but over time it adds up…it just has a weird vibe when the shuttle bus arrives at the camp from Sorrento. Before the bus parks up, the person from the reception stands waiting at the barrier with a money tin waiting for people to come and pay. It’s like they’re just bothered to take money and provide no real hospitality. One night we were taking the shuttle bus to Sorrento from campsite, the timetable stated every half an hour so 18:00/18:30/19:00/19:30. We were walking up a hill and it was 19:27 and the shuttle bus left I went to the reception and I said why is it leaving 3 mins early, the receptionist looked confused and then turned to me and said maybe it was full? You could tell it wasn’t full…we had to wait another half an hour which was very annoying. Then when we got the one at 20:00, as we drove down the hill I asked the driver if he could drop us off near the little roundabout it goes back on itself to pick people up and go back to the camp. The driver started getting annoyed, said he is not a private driver and he will drop us off in the normal place. I said that’s okay. He then started talking in Italian to some other couple, I used google translate voice to see what he was saying. He didn’t say anything rude but it was uncomfortable as I said okay fine as soon as he said that he won’t. What if I didn’t feel well and needed to get off right away? Would I have to wait until the end? Then on the final day when we checked out, we had €3 left and we needed €4 for 2 people to get the shuttle bus to Sorrento. We asked if they could let us off €1 as we didn’t have anymore cash left, we were told no, the reception staff were arguing over €1. We couldn’t pay with card apparently as it was cash only, after 10 mins the person decided to let us pay by card. Just embarrassing really. I read some other reviews and whoever replies to these reviews, seems to like being sassy and arsey. Telling people not to use AI to write a review… the attitude of some the staff that work is the same with some of the review replies are written by you. Once again, campsite had some beautiful views. I think some retraining needs to be done with the way staff deal with complaints and general and basic hospitality.

Pure and quiet terraced site on the steep cliffs near Sorrento. This makes it a bit narrow in some places. Yet spacious places where under the olive trees. Great base to Amalfi Coast on the scooter (to rent through reception) and Capri. The reception is very helpful and friendly. The restaurant on site is great with beautiful views over Sorrento. The waiters are running for you.