Hidden gems in Naples, the city beyond the pizza queue

Napoli Sotterranea, the underground city

Two stops on the metro from the central station, an unmarked door leads down into the Greek aqueducts beneath the city. The same tunnels were extended by the Romans, used as a bomb shelter in WWII, and now form a 40 metre deep underground network you can walk in groups. Bring a jacket, the temperature is 15 degrees year round. Entry around 10 euros, takes 75 minutes.

Rione Sanità, the neighborhood Bourdain put on the map

Just north of the historic centre, Sanità was a no-go zone in the 1980s and now hosts the Catacombs of San Gennaro, the best pizza margherita at Concettina ai Tre Santi, and a slow walk through some of the steepest streets in southern Italy. Take the funicular up to Capodimonte and walk down through the neighborhood.

The real pizza alternatives

Da Michele has a 90 minute queue. The pizza is great. It is not the only great pizza in Naples. Other options that locals actually use:

• -Concettina ai Tre Santi, Rione Sanità, book ahead for the tasting menu
• -Pizzeria Starita, the original of the dough technique, near Via Toledo
• -I Masanielli da Francesco Martucci, technically in Caserta but worth the half-hour train ride
• -Pizzeria La Notizia, Vomero hill, the Enzo Coccia version

Vergini and Materdei

Up the hill from Piazza Cavour, Vergini and Materdei are residential Naples. The Cimitero delle Fontanelle (an ossuary cave church holding thousands of skulls of plague victims) sits up here. The walk down through narrow stairways past family bakeries, the Cantina del Vermouth wine bar, and small pizzerias is the Naples that exists when tourists are not looking.

Pignasecca market at dawn

The Pignasecca market on Via Pignasecca is open from 7am. By 10am the cruise crowd starts to find it but at 7 it is fishmongers, cheese sellers, and grandmothers buying friarielli. Eat a sfogliatella standing up at one of the bakeries, watch the city wake up.

Capodimonte, the museum Naples forgets it has

On a hill north of the historic centre, Capodimonte holds Titians, Caravaggios, and Brueghels in a Bourbon palace surrounded by gardens. The collection rivals anything in Florence. The museum is almost empty most days because it requires a bus ride to reach. Take the bus up, walk down through Sanità.