The most beautiful and biggest island in the Gulf of Naples, Ischia is one of the most famous seaside and touristic spa centres of Italy and the world.
The ancients called it PITECUSAE, AENARIA, INARIME, ARIME, ISCLA.
Today, the island of Ischia is a well-known tourist centre for four main reasons. Firstly, for its unequalled natural beauty, secondly, for its all-year-round mild climate, thirdly for its thermal water, and lastly for its modern tourist facilities and hotels.
Try approaching the island from the mainland (connections with the mainland). The island does not have at all that typical appearance of a large arid rock in the middle of the sea. Rather, it rises from the water like a vision – as though it were a large ship festooned for a party, whose sides, decks, portholes, shrouds, masts and all its other components are decorated with green. Even the peaks of the smallest rocks along the coastline are covered in rich vegetation. Ischia’s ‘greenness’ can even be found in the stones – for example, the famous ‘green tufa’ found in the Forio area, whose stones make up the beautiful and unique ‘PARRACINE’ (dry stone walls) which punctuate the vineyards’ thick green expanses.
However, the greenery does not hide the natural beauty of the lay of the land. Ischia has a very varied landscape, including mountains, isolated hills, majestic promontories, slopes, plains, and brows of hills, all of which can easily be seen from the magnificent terrace of the SOCCORSO in Forio from which the incredible beauty of Mount Epomeo can be enjoyed.
The chalk white of the island houses which gives the scene the magic touch of man’s presence can be glimpsed among the limpid green of the vineyards, the bluish green of the olive groves and the dark green of the orange and lemon groves.
Notice the clear blue sea which still today surrounds the beautiful island of Ischia with its clean waters! Empedocles’ four elements – water, fire, air and earth – can be found on the island of Ischia. Ischia is an incredibly beautiful island lying under a blue sky in the middle of a still unspoilt sea, held up by the fires of its dormant volcano (Epomeo), which makes its presence felt via the many ‘geysers’ and the mineral springs found all over the island.
However, the natural beauty of Ischia does not finish there. Everything from the sea to the mountain – including its harbours, the small bays, its convenient beaches and ports, the high rockface along its coast, the vegetation, the variety of the plant life, the pine trees and the myriads of multi-coloured flowers – make Ischia one of the most beautiful islands of one of the most beautiful countries in the world.
