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The Amalfi Coast is a place where land, sea and sky strike a note of such otherworldly perfection that the region is best approached by boat in order to take in the panorama all at once. After John Steinbeck visited Positano—today the coast’s most famous town—in the 1950s, he wrote in a brilliant essay the poignant, and often quoted, lines: “Positano bites deep. It is a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone.” Some would argue that by now, the massive amounts of tourists during the high season outweigh Amalfi’s stupendous beauty. But most are bewitched and bewildered by the setting (plus, true insiders know that one civilized way of escaping the crowds is to visit on a yacht or a sailboat). Romantics and first-timers almost always spend a few nights in Positano, while return travelers often prefer hillside Ravello, which French author André Gide wrote “is nearer to the sky than it is to the shore.” Wherever you stay, you can’t help but be amazed at the steep landscapes and the villages carved out of brute rock face centuries ago by a resilient people who knew that this perch afforded them the ultimate lookout for invaders. Sitting on the terrace of Le Sirenuse or Il San Pietro, you’re not gazing for enemy ships anymore (only the occasional mega yacht), yet there remains something humbling about those same expansive vistas, which continue to bite deep. (To read Steinbeck’s complete essay, go to the Web site of Le Sirenuse, the hotel where the author stayed.)