Naples and Pompei

Hey all! We have been trying to post to tell you that we are now currently safe and sound in Italy, but the computer at the hostel we are at now, while free, freezes everytime we try to post.

But we validated our Eur rail passes with no problem and got the cheapest tickets that we could get which were at a bargain price. We patiently waited for our ferry at the nice terminal for international trips. The ferry arrived right on time and we hurried out to meat it. The ferry that was to transport us was massive! It was a mini cruise ship really. We got on with nice men in neat uniforms helping us the escalators up to our seats. The ship that we were on boasted several restuarants a cafeteria, hundreds of sleeping rooms, a pool and even a bar and dance floor to make the trip that much more enjoyable. However, these amenities would not be avialable to us. When we had purchased our tickets we thought that deck seat mean a seat inside a enclosed part of the ferry like a bus seat... On this boat when they mean deck seat, they mean it. When we had our tickets checked they told us to go to the very very top, which was the 10th floor of the ferry. There we found our "seats" to be white plastic benchs "enclosed" by plexiglass panels... Joy. Despite this, me and danielle were able to survive, and used our invaluable sleeping bags to survive the somewhat chilly night. The trip in all was 9 hours long and went by moderatley well between interspersed hours of sleep.

In Italy hour levathian of a ship was able to spin on a dime to barely fit into the dock, which was a feat in its self. Italy is like Greece in that the passangers disembark off at the same time as the vehicles creating once again total chaos. As we marched off the boat a gruff Italian in a uniform directed us toward the bus which took us to the train terminal. On the way, we met some amicable travel partners who were two girls that hailed from Australia. They were also going to Naples like us and coincidently enough the same hostel. So with our combined intelligence and increased supply of travellers willing to ask directions we were able to navigate the Italian train system which was pretty chaotic. To actually get to naples we had to make several switchs that made things slightly confusing - three switches. But we made it to Naples and found our lovely hostel. OUr hostel is actually outside of Naples itself, it's in a district called Portici. Portici is very nice, a bit more relaxed than Naples itself. The hostel is called the fabric hostel and is a renovated and converted fabric factory. It is really cool - very modern. We were pretty tired when we got here the first night just because we had been traveling all day. But we still managed to go for real Italian pizza with our new Aussie friends.

Yesterday was POMPEI day. I was excited to go see it, but after learning about the laundry service for only 5 euros we wanted to make use of that. So we jumped on the chance of having clean clothing. The dryers here take a very long time, and after an hour of pacing back and forth waiting for the clothing to be done it wasn't. But we wanted to go. The lady at the desk understood, and offered to take the clothes out of the dryer when they were done and we could pick them up when we were back, so we were free to go. YA! We jumped on the chance and headed for the train station. It was about a 20 minute ride to the pompei station, from which we were just a stones throw from the ruins. We weren't able to get a student price here so it was 11 euros, but it was very much worth it. Unfortunately because it was wash day, all Jan and I had were our jeans. Walking through the ruins, while interesting, was excrutiatingly hot. We went through a lot of water. But what we saw was pretty remarkable. For those of you going to see the site in the next little while, you should remember that pompei was a city of considerable size. If you can get a guide book - which Jan and I did. It was great actually because we went up to a guy and asked how much one was, he said 8 we said thanks no, and walked away but he stopped us saying that he could make a deal, we ended up getting it for half price. Any ways, it was very helpful because there was a map inside from which you could follow the streets to the different highlights. It was a bit erie to walk around in this once amazing town, but it was so cool at the same time. Pompei is so well preserved that there are still frescos on the walls, still graffiti on some of the walls, and layouts of houses and temples remain. Pompei is so well preserved that the research done for constructing things like the sets for the series Rome were taken from here. Most of the information about Rome and the average layout or the town and lifestyles of the people are taken from this preserved site. But it took us the entire day to see all of it. We almost shut the place down. We were exhausted and sweaty by the time we were home, but it was a great day. I have lots of pictures to show you all! It was pretty amazing. After a much needed shower we hit the hay.

Today we went into Naples itself. For anyone interested in Naples, I didn't find it all that great. It is a really busy and VERY dirty city. There are some interesting sites, for example in our wandering we found some gothic churchs, and a 13th century castle called the nuvo castal (new castle). We spent the morning there looking through it. There is a civic museum there that we also checked out. But Naples as a city was a bit disappointing. Pompei rocked though, so if anything it was worth it just for that.

We are now in Rome, we have spent the day seeing some of the worlds greatest sites. We will tell you about them next post.

---

---