Budget · 3-hour walk · Naples
The centro storico in three hours
Spaccanapoli, the tiled cloister of Santa Chiara, the Veiled Christ and the street of crib-makers.
Naples' old centre still runs on the street grid the Greeks laid out for Neapolis: three long parallel streets, the decumani, crossed by narrow alleys. Everything on this route sits within a few hundred metres of the lowest of them, Spaccanapoli, which cuts the old town in two so straight you can see it from the hills. It is loud, crowded and lived in, which is the point. Go in the morning, when the churches are open and the alleys are in shade.
The route, stop by stop
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Piazza del Gesù Nuovo
The church's façade of pyramid-shaped stones was the front of a 15th-century palace before the Jesuits bought it and built behind it. The column in the middle is a baroque spire of saints.
15 min here Walk here → -
Chiostro di Santa Chiara
The nuns' cloister, its benches and octagonal columns covered in 18th-century majolica tiles of vines, lemons and country scenes. Ticketed, and the calmest half hour in the old town.
35 min here Walk here → -
Piazza San Domenico Maggiore
The square on Spaccanapoli, the arrow-straight street that follows the line of the Greek lower decumanus. Scaturchio on the corner has been making sfogliatelle and babà since 1905.
15 min here Walk here → -
Cappella Sansevero
Giuseppe Sanmartino's Veiled Christ, carved in 1753 from a single block of marble so the shroud looks transparent. Timed tickets sell out, so book ahead. No photographs inside.
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Via San Gregorio Armeno
The crib-makers' street, with nativity workshops open all year. Alongside the shepherds and saints, every season brings new figurines of footballers and politicians.
25 min here Walk here → -
Duomo di Napoli
The cathedral of San Gennaro, whose dried blood is expected to liquefy three times a year, in May, September and December. The baptistery inside, from the 4th century, is the oldest in the West.
25 min here Walk here →
More walks in Naples
More in Naples
Every walking route in Naples, the full Naples guide for where to stay and what a day costs, or walks in other cities.