In the hands of Vesuvius

On the morning of Friday August 31, officially the last day of the European high season, it was time to leave Naples, hooray! We battled the delegates for a spot at breakfast one last time, and checked out. We fetched our car from the car park cave (they had moved it and not told us where it was so we were literally wandering through the caves trying to see any flash of light or hear the car doors unlock with the remote key). Having thoroughly pre-studied the route back to the autostrada, we only had to deal with the mad traffic for a little while before we were safely back on the 130km/h freeway, phew! We high-tailed it straight to Pompeii where we would spend the day and stay overnight.

The ruins of Pompeii, with Mt Vesuvius looming guiltily in the background

Not everyone has heard of Herculaneum, but unless you're living under tonnes of ash you would know about Pompeii. Partially destroyed by the eruption of Mt Vesuvius in AD 79, Pompeii was buried under 4-6 metres of ash and pumice, and forgotten about until its excavation began in 1748 (I still haven't worked out why it took that long - the eruption of Vesuvius on that day was documented, so they knew that these towns were buried, but apparently they "were abandoned and their names and locations forgotten"?!). Today though, the Pompeii ruins offer a unique snapshot of a town frozen in time on that particular day.

Pompers

So after less than half an hour, we had already arrived in Pompeii and were able to check in to our little hotel, a 5 minute walk from the back entrance of the ruins. Soon we headed out for lunch in the new Pompeii, which is quite a nice looking town. Ryan had a spaghetti carbonara and I had a plate of clams (both OK, but have both had better), and then soon we set off for the ruins. Just before we got there we got talked into getting a map and audio guide by 2 young and innocent looking girls, and it wasn't too expensive (and ended up being quite helpful) so I don't think we got scammed!

I'm definitely putting a marble kitchen into my house - that stuff stands the test of time (and volcanoes)

The amazing thing about Pompeii is the sheer size of it. While Herculaneum is perhaps better preserved and has more impressive frescoes, Pompeii is a large town, complete with ampitheatres, forums and a brothel (although the little stone beds did not look very comfortable). Oh, and there's also now an Autogrill in the middle of it too. You could spend the whole day walking around the sights, but we did a 2-3 hour wander of various highlights we wanted to see, which was plenty of time, being the warm and sunny day that you can see pictured. This was my second time here, and it is still one of the most interesting places I have ever been in my life.

Reidi in the ruins

They say that Mt Vesuvius is currently dormant, but it occasionally emits lava streams (the last being in the 1950's), and now it is officially 15 years past the time of expected activity. Apparently with today's geophysics technology they would have about 10 days notice before anything major happened, but still, it has happened before... I think they are some brave people living in those towns. Apparently property is very good value (!), but I wonder what the insurance premiums are like?!

A plaster cast of a victim - I find these all very spooky

That evening after washing all the dirt and ash off ourselves, we went back into town for dinner. We went in search of a restaurant that had good reviews on trip advisor, but it didn't seem to exist, so we stopped in at a cocktail bar (I had an awesome coconut mojito!) and by this time a storm had suddenly come upon us (surprising given the skies in the photos above) and so, luckily for us, the accompanying aperitivos supplied with the cocktails were more than substantial, so we were satisified with them and just made it home before the storm hit! It was quite the light show from our balcony though I must say.

The town of Sorrento

The next morning it was time to move onto a place I was really looking forward to, Sorrento on the Amalfi Coast. I had booked us into Villa Monica, the #1 B&B in Sorrento according to trip advisor, and I must agree. The owner, Pasquale, called us the day before and said to give him a buzz when we arrived in town and he would meet us and guide us up the hill to the B&B. How very nice, although Sorrento was crawling with cars, scooters and people, so finding a place to pull into in the narrow streets (without clipping any other vehicles, which we did, but no one seems to care because it is inevitable) was difficult. So we decided to wing it, and get there on our own. It was a pretty hairy and steep street but after bumping into Pasquale's wife (not literally), we got there A.O.K! And the view from our balcony was tremendous!

Buffalo mozarella 4 ways - this is what I will picture when I come home and hit the gym 4 days a week, because it was worth it :)

Even though the weather was overcast and a little bit drizzly at the time, the view was simply breathtaking. And once we met Pasquale, we knew we were in good hands. He was a helpful yet really funny guy, and he would shuttle his guests to and from the main part of Sorrento town whenever they wanted. He recommended a restaurant to us,  Inn Bufalito, which I had already spied on trip advisor (being the buffalo mozzarella addict that I now am), so after a brief walk around town before some rain set in, we got a table at Inn Bufalito. We shared the buffalo mozzarella tasting platter for entree (pictured above) which was one of the most creamy and delicious things I have ever tasted. It was more than enough, but we had already ordered mains (I had a stuffed squid, which was yum and something I hadn't seen offered at many other places, while Ryan had a buffalo ragu, which was simply delicious). Because it had been so good and we are complete fatties, we also shared a panna cotta for dessert (and Ryan had his first taste of limoncello!). Superb meal overall.

And then the next morning we woke up to this view from our balcony:

Ridiculous way to wake up in the morning

Escaping Naples

In defence of Ryan's last blog post, it was me that planned the 3 nights in Naples (hey, who are we kidding, I planned this whole awesome trip), and it wasn't by mistake. I had been here for a few nights on my big trip 10 years ago, but with the reputation that Naples has, my girlfriend Roxy and I did not spend much time outside of our hostel, apart from some amazing excursions to Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius. Being two girls, around 21 years of age, and with limited travelling experience at that stage (at least for me), the fear of heading into the Neapolitan streets is excusable, and so I thought I would give this a second chance, being Italy's 3rd largest city, one of the oldest continuously habited cities in the world, and having the largest historic city centre in Europe, amongst many other things. Also, this time I would be older, wiser and with a protective husband by my side! So I wanted to go back.

The beauty within - Naples' waterfront and Mt Vesuvius

It turned out Naples was not the scary and unsafe city that I had feared when I last visited. It's just chaotic and a bit dirty with all the locals going about their own business! Unfortunately, this is still not the kind of place that grabs me, but I am glad I went back and gave it another go (also, it is so close to so many amazing historic and beautiful townships that I have no choice but to be at least in the vacinity of Naples again!). I can definitely say this however: you will not find better pizza. Pizza was created in this city, and although it seems cliche, I actually did have the best pizza in my life in this town. It was a margherita  (massive in size) for 3.5 Euros.

Marina Grande, Capri

Having said that, we had one more day in Naples where we instead decided to escape to Capri for the day, an island 40 mins boat ride away which has been a resort island for the rich and famous (and boat-loads of tourists) since the Roman times and onwards. It was a lovely day - beautiful weather and only 40 mins on the hydrofoil we arrived before 11am (with a billion other tourists) so decided to wait for the crowds to die down and order a drink at a cafe at the marina. Still being morning I opted for a can of Coke Zero, which set me back 5.50 Euros. Hey cool, they gave us some wifi and I somehow helped alleviate the flailing Italian economy, so all good.

Ryan in front of me heading up the mountain on the chair-lift

As we drank our overpriced drinks, the queue next to us for the funicular did not seem to die, so us being the fatties that we now are decided we could use a bit of a walk uphill. The funicular up to the first town of "Capri" takes 3 mins, but the 750m walk uphill apparently takes 45 mins. Ryan and I busted it out in like 20 mins, yay! We then got the bus to the other main town, Anacapri, which was a windy road right on the edge of the cliff - I could barely look down and it reminded me of the Amalfi Coast, but it was kinda cool and had amazing views at the same time. From Anacapri we then got a chairlift up to Monte Solaro, the highest point on the island. Not being a skiier this was a real novelty for me, and I made sure to hang on to my thongs! You can see Ryan in the chair in the picture above, but the view to the right of us was just beyond description.

Vista from Monte Solaro

Up on top of Mount Solaro we had 360 degree views. It was phenomenal. One of the best vistas (although I've had many) in my life. And would you believe up the top of that mountain there was a cafe/bar with these views? I assumed for an even more obscene price than what I'd just paid for the Coke down below, but no, a few Euros for a wine or beer is all they wanted. Now being afternoon, of course I had a wine. And it was with a view that must be at least in the top 5 of my life.

Happy times!

I had read that the walk back down from the top of Monte Solaro down to Anacapri was pretty easy, and being the adventurous folk that we are, we bought one way tickets on that chair-lift! So although everyone else bought return chair-lift tickets and were heading back down, off we went down the path (there was one other couple doing the same thing) all the way down, with glorious views while working our calves at the same time. It was a great walk, and after nearly getting lost we made it back to Anacapri and stopped in at a trattoria for lunch. We had a pretty decent and cheap meal, and then got the crazy bus back down to Capri, where we walked down to the marina again. Not surprisingly, our calves were well toned (and a tad sore) the next day or so.

Even the statue is giving the view some kind of thumbs up

Once at the marina we went to the nearby "beach", dark pebbles and all. The water, although difficult to get into was lovely and warm yet refreshing. After some floating, it was already time to get the boat back home, which we did. Following our sun-kissed day, we walked back to our hotel and cleaned ourselves up, before heading out to dinner at a little osteria nearby that we had spied the day before. It was great - small and local and quiet, we shared a tasty seafood entree followed by two fish dishes.  All tasty I must say!

Ryan floating in the salty Mediterranean

Napoli, more like crapoli amirite?

We had breakfast admiring the stunning views from our rooftop dining area at the Gaeta B&B then pushed off for the journey to Naples. After being passed by a bunch of cars doing 30-40kph above the speed limit along the 2 lane road with a double white line in the middle we were pulled over by the local polizia for going through an orange traffic light.

Gaeta B&B view from breakfast.

After the first policeman told me I think what was I went through a red light in Italian and some broken French, hearing rosso, rouge a few times. I told him I speak English and said the light was orange or amber, yellow or lemon or whatever word they might understand for an orange light. Anyway he could see we were getting nowhere so he called over his partner pointed at me and said "Inglese". His partner came over and started speaking French but I said Inglese again and he switched. I was told I couldn't go through a red light, I told him I agree, I wouldn't go through a red light and that it was orange, however they were both disagreeing with me. I'm pretty sure it was because I had French license plates on the faithful Dacia Sandero we were driving. Anyway after I pulled out my international drivers license and Aussie passport the problem seemed to disappear with just a stern warning to not go through any orange lights that policeman might construe as red. They must have thought I was a pro driver because anyone who has played the Gran Turismo series of games knows that it's a bit of work to get the international license.

Anyway as if that wasn't enough annoyance for one day we missed a turn on the way to the hotel. I said no worries, I'll just turn up this side street and come back around. This was a mistake. We ended up in a rabbit warren of Naples ghettos and 1 way streets with vespas constantly honking and Italians cursing our car. It was the worst, we finally ended up not being able to go any further and were told by a nice man to go back the way we came. I did a 21 point Austin Powers style u-turn and headed back. We then came to the piazza and were stuck again but another couple of old men eager to help the tourists came to our rescue and told us how to get back to the main highway. In Napoli, old dudes with locale knowledge are way better than Google maps.

We dropped the car off in a parking cave that kind of reminded me of the champange chalk caves in Epernay with the temperature and humidity about the same. We walked the bags down a filthy side street to our hotel and checked in. From the horrible driving experience I was the most stressed I'd been for about 3 years, but luckily we took the Tuscan vino out of the car so I could self medicate.

After a few hours in the fetal position on the bed and a gut full of Chianti, we set out to see the sights of this dirty city. We had a pizza at a restaurant who possibly had the rudest service of the trip. Despite the rudeness the pizza was awesome. Heidi had a caprese and I had a carbonara complete with egg broken over it. I think the pizza in Italy is much better just for these 2 things; super thin and delicate base and buffalo mozzarella. We then went for a walk down to the marina. There's a couple of castles down there which were actually really nice to walk around. Especially the castle that was kind of offshore, but they built a land bridge out to get to it. We also did some shopping because Naples is probably the cheapest place we've been since southern Spain. We had gelati for dinner because we were too full from the ridiculous pizzas we had for lunch.

We found this statue of the woman inside the castle
wishing she hadn't drove into Napoli.

Don't let this outlook of the Castles in the castlello fool you,
Napoli is like Paris, but with a heap more dog shit, rubbish, smell and a lot less charm.

The next morning our hotel seemed to be swarming with some delegates on a conference and we cursed them constantly as they took up all of the breakfast spots each morning. We had to wait until about 9.30 to have our breakfasts but this isn't too bad when you're on holiday anyway.

We walked to the train station and were hussled by eastern European, probably Russian men to buy their ipads all the way. If you are in Europe you must perpetuate a stereotype it appears. If you are African, you sell handbags, if you are Pakistani you sell these helicoptor things that light up at night, if you are Italian you run a Pizza/Pasta/B&B place and if you are Russian you deal in probably stolen Apple goods. I am perpetuating the Australian stereotype by walking around in thongs a singlet and trying to look as un-american as possible.

We caught the train to Herculeum after almost getting on a train from the same platform that was on a different line. Herculeum was really cool to see. I had never even heard of this place as you always hear of Pompeii usually. It was really amazing because the houses are a lot better preserved than Pompeii as they still had some charred timber from the crossbeams that supported roofs still visible and also I think the walls and the frescos on the walls were a lot better preserved. It is not nearly as big as Pompeii but is a hell of a lot easier to get around and see if you have limited time. To see everything in Pompeii you need 4-8hrs depending on walking speed and how much you want to see but Herculeum is around 2hrs. If you have the time definitely see both. There's also some pretty cool graffiti art around Herculeum too, as opposed to the shit tags that riddle Naples.

lol cocks

More hilarious penis, but even uncle Lloyd would have been proud of this tile job.
(FYI uncle I checked the other tiles in other rooms and they ran straight as an arrow.)

Yo dawg, I hear you like cones so here's a cone
so you can have a cone to eat gelati out of another cone.

After the train back to Napoli someone handed me a flyer and I took it for once, this proved to be awesome as we got at 5 euro pizza and drink. Heidi tookup the deal and had one of the best pizzas ever which was just a margharrita. Heidi wanted a coke zero but the deal was only for coke which was the same price on the menu but whatevs. My meal came out which looked like a skinny pizza base with a rocket, proscuitto and parmesean salad on top but when i cut it, it turned out to be a calzone with mozzarella, tomato sauce and speck inside, aw yeah.

We then went out to Sorbillo to have some famous pizza because we didnt have enough pizza these last few days. Goddam, I am sick of pizza.

Summary: Naples is the "real Italy" apparently so say all the websites and hipsters, but fuck it, do a day trip here from your awesome place at the Almafi coast or stay in Pompeii for an extra night. It is not worth staying overnight in. Herculeum, is awesome and definitely worth a visit. Naples might have been better if Heidi or I liked shopping as shit is cheaper. The reality is it's dirty as hell and your precious time and money is better spent in other places. If you like cities, well Roma is around the corner, if you like culture or community, head to Siena, Firenze and Verona. What I'm saying is, don't spend 3 nights in Naples, it's ok, but when in Europe OK isn't enough, there's just so many awesome places around it to not justify the time.

Having a Gaeta old time

We woke up on Sunday morning to unexpected overcast Siena skies and some drizzle. Lucky we had done all our sight-seeing the day before! So after another lazy breakfast in bed we packed up, fetched the car, drove through the ZTL, dumped our bags in the car and checked out. We drove through the Tuscan countryside, which looked pretty spectacular with dark skies and lightning bolts, past some unusual sights - one being a car that had just somehow spearheaded itself into the ground over a guard rail (we drove past this just as the first emergency vehicles were pulling up so I tried not to look too closely - it can't have ended well though) and a porcupine (although dead) on the side of the road, the size of a large wombat!

Arriving at Orvieto, perched high on a hill, just after the storm

We continued driving, into what became torrential rain - some of the heaviest rain I have ever seen - but we dodged the lightning bolts and it passed quickly, and soon we were approaching the Umbrian hill town of Orvieto, quite a spectacular sight as it is situated high on the flat summit of a volcano. We checked in to our hotel, a cute little thing at the bottom of the hill which also had a little balcony decorated with flower pots.

Facade of the Orvieto cathedral

We soon set off up to the main town of Orvieto, via a funicular (aside, whenever I get in a funicular I always get the "funiculi, funicula" song in my head, which I thought was unrelated, but as I later found out it was actually written about funiculars, and in fact about the first one which went up Mount Vesuvius! Go figure). At the top of the hill we enjoyed some vistas, although still with some grey skies at this stage. I had  been recommended a visit to Orvieto by a friend of mine at work, and apart from its amazing situation, it has a fascinating history, partly due to "sitting on its impregnable rock and controlling the road between Florence and Rome". But Google it. I don't have time for history lessons here, I'm just documenting the holiday.

View from Orvieto (with little Ryan top left!)

So we set off in search of lunch, and came across a place with a back courtyard where Ryan enjoyed a pasta with wild boar sauce (tipico de la region, or however they say it in Italian) and I felt like something healthy so had another dose of rockmelon and prosicutto (which, if you don't include the fat and salt content of the prosciutto, actually is quite healthy!). We also tried the local wine - Orvieto Classico wine - which was drinkable but we weren't really fans. We then wandered around the town, and by this time the clouds had all passed and it was all blue skies and 30+ degrees again.

How many Castles are in this picture?

The highlight was the Orvieto cathedral/duomo - the facade was pretty spectacular, with gold paint all glistening in the sun. Ryan picked up another cannoli (these are his favourite, and he's been trying them in most towns since we've been in Italy, but still he says the ones in Haberfield are the best, so it looks as though we'll be coming home after all). We went back and enjoyed the vistas from the top of Orvieto, this time with clear blue skies, and then caught the funicular back down to our hotel, where we enjoyed some wine (from our Tuscan wine tasting haul) on the balcony, which was pretty delightful. We followed this up with dinner around the corner at a family run place - Ryan had a truffle pasta, and I a porcini pizza which was so big that we took half of it home and finished it on our balcony with the rest of the bottle of wine we'd cracked!

Panoramic view from Orvieto

The next morning we hit the road again, had some quick espressos at a trusty Autogrill off the autostrada, and headed back towards the coast, to a town called Gaeta, a seaside town which broke up the drive between Orvieto and Naples. We arrived in town pretty early so stopped for some lunch before checking in to our B&B. We picked a restaurant down at the marina which was pretty empty but seemed fine. When I asked the man for a menu he disappeared for a while but eventually came back, and we were happy enough so took a seat. Minutes later a younger man came out and introduced himself as the owner (who looked well over 50), asked where we were from and was immediately fascinated and told us that his mum does all the cooking and that it's all very fresh and tipco de la region. The other couple of tables that were occupied didn't seem to get any of his attention, but anyway, he was nice and friendly!

View over Gaeta from our rooftop terrace

I had the pasta de la casa (house special) which was with local fish and little tomatoes and was delicious. Ryan had his favourite, spaghetti con vongole which was also delicious! So the Italian mama, who must have been pushing 80, was a wizard in the cucina. Then we drove up the hill to our B&B which was a nice place - perched above the bay in an old building and with a rooftop terrace which overlooked the whole of Gaeta and the bay - stunning. We then set off on a walk around to a beach on the other side of the headland. The water was amazingly warm and there was nice sand, but it was jam packed with tourists all lined up under their umbrellas that you pay an arm and a leg for, so we just went for a quick dip in amongst the throngs.

Panoramic view from the rooftop terrace

Back at the B&B we took one of our Tuscan bottles of wine up to the rooftop and enjoyed it with the vistas pictured above as the sun slowly set - so beautiful. Then we had dinner just down in town nearby - swordfish with an amazing tomato sauce (must have been using those little ones again - so full of flavour!) and Ryan had a bunch of different fried seafood. Afterwards we just headed back home for an early-ish night, ready to tackle the streets of Naples the following day!

The legend of the black cock

On Friday, we grabbed the car back from the carpark across the river in Florence, picked up the bags from hotel and drove out violating a number of ZTL areas. Once we were on the road we wound our way through Chianti hill roads bound for a town called Castellina di Chianti. We got a bit lost as the Castles team navigator was feeling a bit unwell after the windy roads and couldn't look at a map for any amount of time.

It didn't take long to get to a place that offered tastings, as soon as I saw wine barrels and wine tasting in here, I made a turn into the driveway a bit quicker than Heidi's stomach would have liked. When we got inside I asked Heidi if she was up for some wine tastings and she was immediately looking a lot more chirpier. I'm not sure if it was that we had stopped driving or that there was the promise of wines or maybe a combination of the two. Anyway the nice girl there took us through the wines, one white and 2 reds and explained to us what a Chianti Classico was (a blend which must contain 80% sangiovese and whatever other grapes the winemaker has on hand, I think these were 20% merlot). After the wine caining tasting, we got some lunch, I had orrichetti with speck and gorgonzola sauce and Heidi had a salad with some awesome buffalo cheese. Then we purchased the pinot grigio and a bottle of the Chianti Classico to take with us.

Chianti country

Oak barrels with wine tasting signs, QUICK PULLOVER!

When we got to Rada I saw another lot of barrels next to a driveway with "wine tasting" and I quickly made a sharp turn into it. We got to another winery which was owned by an Italian American which had 2 different labels so we got to try about 7 wines there. I asked the lady what the deal was with the black cock (gallo nero) logo at the Chianti wineries as we thought it was some kind of winery chain. She told the legend of gallo nero which was quite a funny story. We purchased some more wines one of which was an interesting blend of white of 60% chardy, 35% sav blanc and 5% gewurztraminer.

We continued onto Siena, bypassing more yummy tastings as I had to spit out the last lot of wines so I could continue driving. (I find spitting wine out completely unnatural and my mouth can't bring itself to do it voluntarily, so I kind of hang my head over the spitoon, open my mouth and it just dribbles out.)

Once in Siena we were immediately failed by Google driving directions as there were road works on apparently the only street which would provide entrance on the side of the city we needed to get into. Hooray for ZTLs! They really made these old cities hard for invading armies to get into, there are paved roads these days and it's hard enough now. Anyway we found a crack in their defenses probably by violating some ZTL laws and made it in.

We walked around the old town which reminded me of Toledo with the red roof tiles and tiny hilly streets. We had dinner at a place recommended by trip advisor which was on a hill we sat outdoors but they had terraced seating with the tables and chairs propped up to match the slope. What will these Italians think of next?

Terraced dining.

The next day after a lazy breakfast in bed thanks to the hotel delivering the breakfast tray to our room we went out and got some produce to have for lunch. We had some leftover tomatoes and basil from Florence so we just needed some more buffalo mozzerella and bread. I also got some weird pressed meat which was like a massive salami made of what I would call proscuittoed bacon. Aw yeah. We got back to the hotel and made up some sammiches to cain in the hotel giardino.

Hotel garden above the 2nd floor roof but below our room of course.

After lunch we needed another degustazione of Italian wines so we headed to the Enocteca Italiana which was a wine tasting place situated in the Fortezza Medicia. Caining wine in some ramparts is almost as good as caining wine by the beach but slightly more of a cultural experience I think.

On the way back home we ran into a pretty big street parade which was basically the area of the winning horse of the Palio di Siena parading around and rubbing all the losing neighborhoods faces in it every day we were there. I think a waiter we had said the parties go for a week or something. Anyway heaps of people were in the parade including a bunch of old dudes smoking cigars and holding prosseco bottles like bosses and the Saints of 2nd place which was I think carrying photos of all the times their neighbourhood came 2nd.

The parade was a miner distraction to the rest of the Siena community.

The 2nd place saints

The winning horse

When we were sick of the parade we walked back into town and had dinner at the same terraced restaurant because it was pretty good the night before. After dinner we walked into the main square, got a plastic glass of spritz and went and sat down in the square because that seemed to be the thing to do.

Siena was awesome and so was the Chianti area, I wish we had more time in the region and think I would definitely come back if we're over this way again especially if there's a horse race on again. I think the Tuscany area has been my favourite part of Italy so far, yeah I said it, even better than Cinque Terra. Next time we will rent a house in Tuscany and damn the maestro.