GO ITALY:At the heart of the Italian family holiday is the feeling that children are welcome anywhere, anytime, writes Brian O'Connell
WE WERE ON the third day of our stay at Hotel Poseidon in Positano, on the Amalfi Coast, during one of the busiest weekends of the Italian holiday calendar. For the two previous days staff at the four-star family-run boutique hotel had played football in the lobby with my eight-year-old, put a camp bed for him in our room, ruffled his hair at every opportunity and generally treated him with the reverence and adoration with which ancient Egyptians might have looked on the boy Tutankhamen.
No one talked down to him, he was introduced to other children staying at the hotel and everyone, from the busboy to the bandleader, had time to make him feel all grown-up. The chef even taught him how to make pizza during a busy lunchtime, showing him how to spread the tomato sauce on the base and allowing him to chop the pepperoni. Try getting a hotel in Killarney to do that over a bank-holiday weekend.
What we experienced wasn't just the usual tourist niceties or extended professional courtesy. At the heart of the Italian family holiday experience are sincerity, warmth and a feeling that children are welcome anywhere, anytime. For Italians this is the natural order, not part of a marketing drive.
Our aim was to spend a week in Italy, testing three hotels to see how they responded to and provided for a couple with a robust eight-year-old in tow.
Hotel Poseidon, our first stop, began life in the 1950s as a private villa, when the Aonzo family bought a piece of land with a view of the gulf of Positano. Today it works as a 48-room hotel, run by Marco Aonzo and his sister Monica, and has been modernised to include Turkish baths, beauty treatments, gym and outdoor swimming pool.
The chef has stuck to local tradition for the menu, with some of the recipes stretching back more than 300 years, including shrimps au gratin in lemon leaves, and lentil-and-escarole soup. Dinner is served in a hanging garden overlooking the town. The Poseidon bar is well stocked and friendly, ideal for before- and after-dinner drinks.
There is no children's menu. As with many rural Italian restaurants, chefs expect kids to be treated in the same culinary manner as adults, albeit with smaller portions. What a joy, then, not to have to choose between chicken nuggets, sausages and fish sticks. (Room service did manage a toasted sandwich late one night, as a special request.)
Activities during the daytime included hiring a speedboat and exploring the coast from Sorrento to Minori, and taking a day trip to Pompeii.
But be warned: the Amalfi Coast, with its winding hills and countless steps, requires a certain amount of physical exertion. If your idea of a family holiday involves minimal movement, or if the small ones are buggy bound, then perhaps this region is not for you.
From Amalfi we headed to Florence and the three-star Hotel Caravaggio, a few hundred metres from the main train station, in the centre of the city. The rooms were basic but clean, and the staff were helpful, although a little less hands on than in Positano. Perhaps it's a city-country thing.
Across the road from the hotel a large park with some play facilities helped keep the young lad occupied. Two hotel computers, with internet access, were available in the bar, allowing for close supervision.
The city is casual and relaxed enough to allow children and adults to walk around late at night in relative safety. We asked at a tourist office about things to do for children; within the city centre, a large outdoor swimming pool and frequent live-music nights appeared the best options.
An exhibition of Leonardo da Vinci's machines was worth a look, although none of the exhibits was specifically tailored to children.
Mainly, Florence was where pocket money was spent and Italian city life could be experienced in a relaxed and stress-free manner.
Our final stop was the four-star Hotel Quirinale, on Via Nazionale in Rome, within walking distance of several attractions, including the Forum and Colosseum. Suites here were enormous, complete with dressing rooms, large bathrooms and entertainment systems. At night we had the choice of watching the latest movies - pricey at €10 a go - or relaxing in the spacious bar.
While the walls may have been wafer thin, allowing us to hear the minutiae of marriage strife from an American couple in the next room, the views from our third-floor bay windows were spectacular.
The hotel itself gives the impression of regal grandeur, with a distinctively French elegance. Guests were generally older tourists, businesspeople and tour groups: we saw very few kids hanging about.
Dinner struck us as extraordinarily bad, with little in the way of children's choices, poor service (a 50-minute wait during a quiet time) and Basil Fawlty-type management.
Asking for suitable children's events at reception was difficult, given that staff always seemed preoccupied and rather unapproachable. We did follow up the suggestion of a trip to Explora, a dedicated children's museum on Via Flaminia. It was a wonderful facility and one of the highlights for Junior, who got to play doctor, work in a pretend bank and experiment with all sorts of specially tailored machines.
We also crammed in visits to the Vatican, sites of Roman architecture, the Olympic stadium and several large outdoor parks. Be warned, though: Rome can be expensive, especially at mealtimes, when bread and cover charges add up.
If your children are into guts and gore, then the Crypt of the Capuchins is a perfect way to round off a family visit to Rome. In 1631 Capuchin friars had to move from their old friary to the present site, near the Trevi Fountain, taking with them the remains of their deceased friars. The bones of more than 4,000 of them are eerily laid out underneath the present church along the walls, decorating everything from lampshades to door handles. Shallow graves and decomposing friars also populate the crypt - without doubt one of the most fascinating and macabre sites in the city. Kids, needless to say, will love it.
Where we stayed with my 8-year-old
Hotel Poseidon. Via Pasitea, Positano, 00-39-089-811111, www.hotelposeidonpositano.it/en. Prices range from €240 to €575 per night. Open from late April to early November.
Hotel Caravaggio. Piazza Indipendenza, Florence, 00-39-055-496310, www.hotelcaravaggio.it. From €69 to €150 per night.
Hotel Quirinale. Via Nazionale, Rome, 00-39-06- 4707, www.hotelquirinale.it. Costs between €200 and €300 per night.
Go there
Aer Lingus (www.aerlingus. com) flies from Dublin to Naples, about 50km from Positano. It also flies to and from Rome. Ryanair (www.ryanair.com) flies between Dublin and Pisa, about 100km from Florence.