Naples, Pompei and Vesuvius

Thursday 5 April

We left Rome and headed to Anagni where we found a free camper stop at the edge of town and next to the local cemetery but it had all the services we needed and the views were amazing.

We took a walk up to the town and paid a visit to the Palace which wasn’t exactly what we were expecting but after a walk around we went and sat in the square for a coffee and piece of cake.

One other camper joined us for what was a very quiet night however, we were woken at 7.30am by lots of chatter, open the blinds and the carpark is absolutely jammed packed with buses, cars, kids and parents. It was apparently the drop off point for a school trip so no lie in for us this morning.

Friday 6 April

On our approach to Naples, it almost felt like we were driving back in Morocco although the roads in fact are far worse than the Moroccan roads, they are absolutely dreadful shaking the life out of poor Eugene who was trying his very best to stay in one piece, dash cam crash sensor going off, cupboards opening and stuff falling off the shelves, our own bodies being shaken to the core.

As we drive further south towards Naples the roads are no better and we start to see huge piles of rubbish dumped on the side of the road and in the lay-bys and as we got closer to the city it got much worse, the rubbish was everywhere, some lay-bys were just rubbish sites with no room left to stop or park.

Graffiti was everywhere, every building or piece of street furniture was covered, not the type that you can stop and admire but vandalism.

Because of the cost we are avoiding the Toll Roads, but not sure this is a good idea as we struggled driving through the towns, cars parked on either side of the narrow roads and a constant stream of traffic coming towards us in all directions, cars pulling out in front of us and stopping anywhere they liked, scooters appearing from out of nowhere and people just casually strolling in between everything. Every driver using a mobile phone. Thankfully, we finally got to the camperstop in a Sosta at Castagnaro Parking in Quarto unscathed.

The camperstop has a bus stop right outside the gate to the metro link into the city which is a 50 minute ride into the city centre of Napoli.

We purchased transport tickets from the campsite for 1.60 Euro for 90 minutes of travel, one ticket will get us into the city.

We leave the campsite and there’s a guy in a car parked outside the gates, he speaks with us, only Italian, French and two words of English. We think he tells us he is a guide and could take us around the city if we wanted, we say no we’re going on the bus. He gives us his phone number for us to call him if we have problems with the metro. If we have problems and call him god knows how he’s going to know where we are lol. Anyway we’re sitting at the bus stop when he pulls up, he’s going to work and will drop us off at the metro free of charge, okay we jump in and have the a hell of a ride to the metro station, thankfully we arrive without incident god knows how.

Naples

We arrive in the center of the city and it’s busy so we head to the old part of town, this is even busier when we find ourselves in the famous street called Spaccanapoli which is a long narrow street that cuts through the old historic town of Naples and provides access to a number of important sites in the city. It’s full of bars, shops, tat shops and crowds of people.

The cake and ice cream shops are amazing with long queues waiting outside, we couldn’t get anywhere near them.

Naples is the home of the pizza and it would be rude not to try one out. We found a busy restaurant and each had a 12 pizza, best I think I’ve ever eaten.

Although Naples is full of rubbish and graffiti it smells of clean washing hanging high on the buildings in the small streets.

 Of all the places we’ve been so far the most amazing thing I’ve seen is the Greek-Roman Aquaduct 40 metres below ground. It is an incredible piece of excavation work carved out the rock by hand by the Greeks and used as water cisterns for the city for over 23 centuries and later used as air raid shelters during the war.

We had to walk through dark tunnels only 50cm wide and over 153 meters long. Unfortunately Keith suffers from terrible claustrophobia, hadn’t done his research properly and couldn’t go through the tunnels. The aquaduct caverns are amazing.

Pompei

We leave the Sosta to head to Pompei, Keith toys with the idea of taking the toll road then decides it’s only 17 miles down the road. 2 hours later with every swear word Keith knows used, horn honked a hundred times and I’ve got my eyes shut the whole way we finally arrived at the campsite Camping Fortuna Village. The site is right across from the archaeological site and train station.

We were up early and at the entrance for 9am to beat the crowds but there were no crowds and we hardly see any one else til nearly 11am.

Pompei has been a life long dream for Keith so again he was in his element we spend nearly 5 long hours walking around and we did our live radio interview from inside the site next to the auditorium.

In 1863, Italian archeologist Guiseppe Fiorelli took charge of the site and began proper excavation of it. Fiorelli recognized that the soft ashes on the site were actually cavities left from the dead, and he is responsible for filling them with high-grade plaster. Thus, the preserved bodies of Pompeii were born.

Mount Vesuvius

Mount Vesuvius is one of the world’s most dangerous volcanoes and we can see it from the campsite. The volcano has an eruption cycle of about 20 years, but the last eruption was in 1944, let’s hope it stays that way at least until we’ve left the country.

It’s a lovely clear day and we can see the top of Vesuvius, yesterday it was completely covered in clouds and it was closed for safety reasons.

We decide to take the public bus to Mount Vesuvius 3.10 euros for a one way ticket. We get the bus at 9.40am, our driver actually believes he a contender in the Grand Prix as we throws the bus around the winding road up to the starting point of the walk whilst texting and speaking on his mobile phone.

We take the long steep 20 minute walk to the top of the crater and the magnificent views of the cities below start to disappear under a thick cover of rolling clouds.

We get to the top as the cloud starts to engulf the top of the crater so we jostle for position to get to the fence to hang over the top of the crater to see the bottom of the live volcano.

I am very disappointed to find that it’s not a red hot bubbling hole of malt and lava but a crater full of stone and rubble with a few puffs of smoke coming out the rocks. But it’s a live volcano Keith says.

We get the bus back and a new driver has taken pole position as he totally ignores the 30 miles an hour speed limit down the winding road and hoots at anything and anyone who looks like they might bet him to the finish line. We get back to camp in one piece, phew.

We are still chasing the sun it appears for a day or two then its moved on somewhere else just wish it would stay still.

There is finally progress with my recovery from Bells Palsy, over the past week my right cheek has started to contract which makes the side of my mouth in to a smile, its not much but its progress at last.

A la perchoine

Shirena & Keith