Botania Relais and Spa, Ischia, Italy: Island resort turns its back on the sea, with sublime results

Turning its back on the sea to face the island's forested interior makes Botania a sublimely peaceful place.

It's Friday afternoon, mid-summer, and everyone seems to be escaping Naples. For good reason. When I arrive on the train from Rome, southern Italy's largest city is hot, crowded and noisy. At the port, I almost get lost in a labyrinth of construction hoardings then sidestep a phalanx of cruise ship security guards before finally, gratefully, stepping aboard a fast ferry to Ischia, the largest island in the Bay of Naples and recently voted "the best island in the world" by Travel + Leisure.

An hour later, I'm disembarking with a ferry-load of Neapolitans (never call them Italians) who soon disperse to their weekenders and holiday rentals while I wait for a taxi. A salty breeze ruffles my hair, the sun shines down out of a clear blue sky, seagulls call to each other.

Ischia's reputation might have grown since Elena Ferrante's Naples-based novels were made into HBO series in 2018 and 2020, but it's nowhere near as busy as Capri or the Amalfi coast, both south of Naples (Ischia is due east of the city).

The 25-metre saltwater pool oasis.

It helps that my base for three days is the gorgeously nature-centric Botania Relais and Spa, a five-star resort set on three hectares of beautifully manicured gardens on the island's northwest corner.

When my taxi driver drops me at the entrance, I'm sure he's brought me to the wrong place. Botania looks more like a sprawling private residence than a resort, its rooms and suites spread across 10 Mediterranean-style "villas" named after plants – my Superior room is in "Oleandri" (oleander) – which gives it an air of refinement and seclusion.

The décor in my room is summery and elegant, the white walls and all-white bed linen offset by garden-print cushions and framed botanical drawings on the walls. I slip off my sandals, put on a fluffy white bathrobe and pad about barefoot on the cool tiled floor. There's a coffee-maker and a smart TV, as you'd expect in a five-star property, but the highlight is at the far end of my room: French doors open onto a small courtyard and my own private garden.

The décor in my Oleandri Superior room is summery and elegant.

Some rooms and suites have ocean views, but for the most part Botania turns its back on the sea. At first this seems odd for an island resort, but I soon realise that with the coastline a Jenga-like jumble of holiday apartments and beachfront hotels, facing the island's forested interior makes Botania sublimely peaceful.

On the way to breakfast the next day, I step out of my room and look straight up at Mount Epomeo, Ischia's highest peak, spotlit by the morning sun. In the restaurant beside the 25-metre saltwater pool I meet Luigi Polito; he and his wife Rita Buono own Botania and because they live just down the road they can often be seen around the resort.

"You know what I love about being here in the morning?" Luigi tells me. "The music of the birds. And the perfume of the flowers. Every day you find new flowers, new smells, new colours. It's always changing."

Guests can enjoy two new plunge pools set on sunny stone terraces behind the resort.

After growing up on Ischia, he and his brother opened the island's first hotel 40 years ago: Parco Maria, named after their mother. Today Luigi runs an online travel company and owns another five-star resort in the Aeolian islands off Sicily, but Botania clearly has a special place in his heart. "Our philosophy is that luxury belongs to three things: space, nature and quietness," he says.

In keeping with its natural ethos, the resort has three "zero-kilometre" restaurants; all their ingredients come from Botania's organic kitchen garden or from elsewhere on this volcanically fertile little island. There's the original, poolside Il Corbezzolo restaurant; Il Mirto, named after Ischia's native myrtle trees, which opened last year, the only vegetarian/vegan restaurant on the entire island; and La Cucina di Nonna Mari, new this summer, which serves light meals to guests enjoying the two new plunge pools set on sunny stone terraces behind the resort.

You can't beat Italian (sorry, Neapolitan) food made with love from fresh, local, seasonal ingredients. My meals at Botania range from an exquisite six-course vegetarian degustation dinner to a simple lunch of bruschetta made with tomato and rocket from the garden on just-baked bread, drizzled in Ischian olive oil, served with a glass of Vigna del Lume from Mazzella, one of 20 wineries on the island.

The evening before I leave, Luigi and Rita lead me up a stone path that climbs the hill behind the pool to show me their "little Roman theatre", laughing and talking all the way. When we emerge, there's a 100-seat amphitheatre, where Botania hosts summer concerts, and a spectacular view: Ischia's northern forests, coastal villages and snaking roads under a bright full moon. Suddenly silenced by the beauty below, Luigi takes my hand in both of his and looks me in the eye. "You have friends on Ischia now," he says.

That's how it is at Botania. Within a day or two you feel as if you've been holidaying there all your life – or adopted by a big Italian family. On my last morning I spend so long saying goodbye to staff members and other guests I've met that I start to worry I'm going to miss my ferry back to Naples. Then I see Rita, watering some lemon trees. She puts down her hose and gives me a calming hug. "Come back and see us soon," she says, waving, as I almost skip down the path to my waiting taxi.

FIVE MORE THINGS TO DO ON ISCHIA

CLIMB EPOMEO

​The hike to the top of Ischia's highest peak, 789 metres above sea level, rewards you with views across the Gulf of Naples to Vesuvius; there's also a church and a small ristorante at the top.

FOLLOW FERRANTE

​Ischia Guided Tours runs half-day and day tours visiting spots mentioned in Elena Ferrante's first two Neapolitan novels My Brilliant Friend and The Story of a New Name. See ischiaguidedtours.com

HAVE A SOAK

Negombo Thermal Park, one of about 100 natural hot spring complexes on Ischia and a 10-minute stroll from Botania, is a beachfront waterworld for adults and children alike. See negombo.it

'APE' AROUND

Do a lap of the island (about 45 minutes) in one of Ischia's colourful open-sided micro-taxis, tuk-tuks that resemble the three-wheeler "ape" ("bee") trucks used by Italian farmers. Ask the concierge at Botania.

SEE MORE GARDENS

Giardini La Mortella is a subtropical/Mediterranean public garden open April-October and created by Argentinian-born Susana Walton for her composer husband, Sir William Walton, in the 1950s. See lamortella.org/en/

THE DETAILS

STAY

Botania Relais & Spa has 50 rooms starting at €300 ($445) a night and is open from April to October. Rates include a spectacular buffet breakfast, a non-alcoholic minibar, use of the spa and gym, and shuttle bus transfers to the beach and nearby towns. Children aged 12 and over are welcome. See botaniarelais.com/en/

FLY

Emirates flies to Rome via Dubai twice daily from Sydney and Melbourne and daily from Brisbane and Perth. See emirates.com/au/English

From Rome, catch the Frecciarossa express train to Napoli Centrale, the main station in Naples, then take the subway or a taxi to the port of Beverello. Ferries leave regularly for Ischia. See trenitalia.com, alilauro.it/en

MORE

traveller.com.au/Italy

Louise Southerden stayed as a guest of Botania Relais & Spa with carbon-offset flights by Intrepid Travel.