Sant'Angelo village and its isthmus

Sant'Angelo is the prettiest thing on Ischia and the smallest: a knot of white, ochre and pink houses on a slope above two little harbours, with a piazza at the bottom that ends in the water. Cars stop at the top of the hill and you walk down, which is why the place still feels like a village rather than a resort strip.

The subject is the isthmus. A strip of sand a few metres wide runs out from the piazza to the rock of Sant'Angelo, a green hump with a ruined tower on it, so you can photograph two beaches, a village and an island in one frame from the terrace above the harbour. The classic angle is from the road as you come down, looking over the roofs to the rock beyond.

The village faces south, which means good light most of the day and hard light in the middle of it. Early morning and the hour before sunset are the times to work; in the evening the west-facing harbour side glows and the whole slope goes warm.

Boats leave from here for Sorgeto and the Maronti, which is the easy way to reach both, and taxi boats run all summer. The lanes are steep and stepped, and the isthmus itself narrows in rough weather, so check the sea before promising anyone a photograph standing on it.