More ruins in the rain (is there a play title in that??)

A continuation of trip reports from our 2007 trip to Italia (most of the really good photos weren't taken by me; maybe there's a blog post in there somewhere)...

TRIP REPORT - POMPEII

Boy, were we glad we went to Capri the day before, since it was raining when we woke up the next morning.  But it was only supposed to be sprinkling, so we decided to try for Positano anyway.  However, we stood at the bus stop and waited for a bus for an hour and none come, so we gave up and got on the train to Pompeii - it was fortunate that the trains and buses both left from the same station.  This was serendipitous for us, because if we had saved Pompeii for the next day, we wouldn’t have been able to go because of a transit strike!  We got an earful about that in the B&B that night.  So we lucked out. 

The train trip to Pompeii is quick and easy, and from the station, it's a quick walk to the ruins.  There were several food trucks outside the entrance, so far be it for us to not sample Italian food truck snack foods.  I got a chocolate croissant.  Even a pre-packaged chocolate croissant, excuse me, cornetto, in Italy is better than anything you can get here.

Because it was raining (and off-season), there weren’t very many people at Pompeii.  We bought our tickets and just wandered around without a guide or book.  We did have the pages from Rick Steves’ book as an outline, but we mainly walked around and looked at whatever caught our fancy.  Perhaps I should write a book called Catch My Fancy - Meandering Through Italy.  There was one large tour group there, so we did try to stay away from them and have enough room to move around.  But, again, it was kinda spectacular to be touring a site as if it were our own private ruin.


Pompeii is just incredible.  It’s amazing to think about the history of the place and what led to the ruins we were wandering.  And the fact that there is so much paint and tiling existing is also amazing.  Oh, heck, everything was incredible.  A town that was destroyed by a volcano in 79AD, yet wasn't even accidentally discovered until 1749, is rather a miracle.  There truly had to be a 'perfect storm' of things to happen for everything to be so preserved.  The details in many of the rooms was astounding. 


So, it was still cold in the area of the baths, and the beds were still apparent in the brothel.  The olive press looked ready to work, and the tiles outside the houses were still welcoming.  It was a little disappointing that a lot of the houses weren’t open, but it didn’t bother us that much.  We especially enjoyed going to the amphitheater and doing a little ‘singing in the rain.’  I got a charming video in the amphitheater and find the sound there just as amazing every time I watch. 


We probably spent three and a half hours at Pompeii and would’ve stayed longer, but we got ushered out at a seemingly-early closing time.  Which is a good thing, in retrospect, since we realized we were really wet and cold.  We did make a pit stop in the gift shop, though, which had some remarkable things.  We also discovered many of Pompeii's treasures aren't actually IN Pompeii - they're in Naples!  At the Museo Archeologico, which was just down the street from our hotel!  Sigh.  I probably could've done a little better research on that.  Oh well, just another reason for a return visit.  Anyway, after taking one last look at Vesuvius (I cribbed this photo from the 'net, since mine was so dark and blurry), we went to the train station. 


After taking the train back to Sorrento, we rested up in the hotel room for a bit (I tried to dry my wet socks with the blow dryer!), and then we tried another restaurant recommended by a couple in our B&B: L’Antica Trattoria.  Happily, this was a much better experience than the night before.  The servers were fun and took excellent care of us.  They seemed to enjoy our attempts at Italian and were happy to recommend dishes and wine.  The recommendations were all delicious.  Sticking to my plan devised the night before, I only got an appetizer of prosciutto and mozzarella, which was amazing, so that I could try another version of the delizia a’limone.  Ahhhhhhh.  Again—delicioso.  I highly recommend it.  Let me describe it for you:  two layers of a sponge cake-type confection, filled with the lightest, creamiest lemon curd you've ever tasted.  The whole cake then is covered in a sort of lemon buttercream, THEN there's lemony whipped cream on top of that!  To die for!  I was so raving about the lemon dessert that our server brought us a real Sorrento lemon to see (and eat)!  I’m sure he thought it was amusing to watch the Americans eat a raw lemon.  But it was delicious, too.  I think it's highly unfair that the lemons can't be exported to the States.  I want them.

Since it was still raining, we didn’t do any more shopping that night but went back to our B&B and joined the other guests in a lively conversation about travel.  A very nice way to again end a day.  Tomorrow, Positano or bust!