Naples, 19-20 September: the San Gennaro miracle at the Duomo, the Amerigo Vespucci in port, Eliades Ochoa for €10, water lilies and our Social Park.
It’s the most Neapolitan weekend of the year: on Saturday 19 the city waits for the blood of San Gennaro, on Sunday 20 the tall ship Amerigo Vespucci sails into port, and in the evening you choose between a Cuban concert for €10, water lilies in bloom at the Mostra d’Oltremare and a Sunday in the park with us. Here’s everything day by day, with times, venues and prices, checked at the source. The full listings, beyond the weekend too, are on the Things to do in Naples page; the version that updates itself every morning is this weekend.
A practical warning: on the 19th the old centre fills up from dawn and you can’t get near the Duomo after 9am. If the festival isn’t your thing, head for the sea or the hills that day and come back to the centre in the evening.
Saturday 19: San Gennaro at the Duomo
On 19 September Naples Cathedral celebrates the city’s patron saint, and the city waits for his blood to liquefy, as it has every year since the 15th century. The cathedral opens in the morning and fills up at once: if you want to see anything, arrive early; if you just want to soak up the day, wander Via Duomo and the decumani, the old centre’s ancient main streets, where the celebrations carry on outdoors until evening. Free, of course.
If you’d rather be by the sea, there’s the Tour del Giallo in Posillipo: Saturday and Sunday at 10am from Calata dei Due Frati, a guided seaside walk through true crime and noir novels, free with booking by email. And if you have kids, every Saturday morning until December there’s Giro Giro Napoli, free visits to the city’s museums designed for them.
Saturday night: De Crescenzo, La Traviata in the courtyards, the Certosa by night
At 9pm Eduardo De Crescenzo brings “Essenze Jazz” to the Arena Flegrea on Viale Kennedy: the extra date added after June’s sell-out, tickets on etes.it. On Saturday and Sunday evening, meanwhile, “Traviata da Cortile” moves into the Kimbo courtyards: opera without the opera house, an arm’s length from the singers; details and booking from the organiser.
On Saturday and Sunday, from sunset, the moat of Castel Sant’Elmo hosts the Pessoa Luna Park: concerts, DJ sets, open-air cinema and shared tables, entry €2.50 (free for under-18s and over-65s), open Thursday to Sunday until 4 October. On Sunday evening the Notturni in Certosa return to San Martino too, evening visits with the city below: times and booking on the museum’s website.
Sunday 20: the Vespucci in port and a Bavarian festival
On Sunday the Amerigo Vespucci, the Italian Navy’s training ship, arrives in Naples and stays in port until the 25th. Visits on board are free but only with a named booking on the tour’s official website, which publishes the pier and times in the days before: no other channel issues passes, so be wary of anyone offering them.
At the Palapartenope on Via Barbagallo, Saturday and Sunday bring the first weekend of OktoberDays, the Bavarian festival with long shared tables, food, fairground rides and a kids’ area, tickets online. It’s on again from 24 to 27 September. At the Mostra d’Oltremare, until Sunday, there’s the international chess festival “Il Tesoro di San Gennaro”: if you play, sign up; if not, it’s still a nice place to watch people concentrating very hard.
Sunday evening: Eliades Ochoa, water lilies, Social Park
The best night of the weekend costs €10: at 9pm at Villa Vannucchi in San Giorgio a Cremano, Eliades Ochoa, the voice and guitar of the Buena Vista Social Club, plays for the Ethnos Festival. Twenty minutes from the centre on the Circumvesuviana, the local train that runs round Vesuvius, and a Vesuvian garden for Cuban son.
From 6pm, at the Mostra d’Oltremare, “Esedra in Fiore”: the water lilies in bloom in the monumental fountain at sunset, with an aerial dance performance over the water. Free with booking on Eventbrite, up to four places per person. At 7pm, free, the church of the SS. Annunziata hosts an evening of Piedigrotta Viva, songs and stories from the city’s oldest festival.
And then there’s our Sunday: 6pm to midnight at the Parco del Poggio in Colli Aminei, Social Park vol. II, with DJ sets, a live show from the Paradise City Breakers, food, a market, a kids’ area and a dog area, and views over the city from the park. Free entry with booking; it’s the event we sponsor, and you’ll find us there. The booking link is in the weekend listings.
All weekend: exhibitions and festivals
Things that carry on after Sunday:
- Emilio Isgrò, “Canto Napoli” at Capodimonte: his erasures on the scores of Neapolitan songs, until 29 September, with the museum ticket
- Maria Lai, “Essere è tessere” at the Madre, the contemporary art museum: until 12 October, €8
- Philip Colbert at Pompeii, included in the site ticket, until 30 November
- Evenings in the Grande Pompei: every Friday and Saturday until 10 October the Park’s sites open 7.30pm-11.30pm, €7 per site
- Vespero Napoletano, the city council’s slow-tourism festival: walks and workshops in the neighbourhoods until 24 October, free while places last
If you’d rather book something certain
At weekends experiences sell out faster: the 75-minute boat trip round the bay is the easiest way to see the Vespucci from the water, the street food tour in the old centre is the alternative to the San Gennaro crowds if you still want the decumani, and Neapolitan song without microphones rounds off a Sunday nicely. All with free cancellation up to 24 hours before.
The listings with all the events, including the following week’s, are in Things to do in Naples: pick your dates and see what’s on, with the experiences you can book on those days.
- things to do
- weekend
- september
- san gennaro
- events
- free
Who wrote this
Gianluca Scanni
Founder @ Cose Fighe
