Blogs from Naples, Campania, Italy, Europe

Feeling worse and worse so made the decision to head home tomorrow. I called Road Scholar, as they made the initial plane reservations for us, and got reservations for Friday. Immediately felt better about things. Went to a deli for lunch and a men's store for Mike to buy a beautiful sweater jacket. The 'landlord' reserved a taxi for us in the morning, very kind of him. Our original plan had been to go to New Year's Eve in Florence and a few days in Rome; that was accomplished and we enjoyed ourselves!... read more

The morning aim was to purchase train tickets from Naples to Caserta for the 4thof July and tickets for tomorrow from Naples to Sorrento. Mission accomplished. We spent all the morning walking the crowded streets. Everywhere is crowded all the time … locals, tourists, refugees. There are many homeless people sleeping on footpaths or begging. Large containers for rubbish and bins are overflowing. It would be difficult to keep such a bustling, crowded old city such as Naples clean. Car horns continually blare … the ‘creep’ along and between, by vehicles, keeps the traffic moving and people relatively safe when crossing roads filled with vehicles. Scooters heading towards or coming up behind you on footpaths is common too. One must be 360o aware. Police are everywhere. All are armed. Even with the above being said, I ... read more

Italy has never been an economically wealthy land since the Lira time. From fascist to crisis, as my dearest friend beautifully described. And now this innocent land is in the hand of a hideous Roman fascist. Another soul which brought so much hatred to the world! Bright future ahead for Italy, my arse! My feminism refuses to be silent as she won the election. I vouch for female leaderships. I have high respect for female leaders, not her. I am neither left, right or centre but find her regime disturbing. She's the perfect example of a Roman fuckwit chosen by a bunch of Italian fruit loops. It seems that she needs a constant reminder that her nation is geographically in the South, where Northern and Western Europe continue throwing money to revive it. Italy first, she ... read more

The day finally arrived! Maggie departed Naples on board the MV World Odyssey, her floating college campus for the next 4 months! She actually boarded yesterday, 1/5, after testing negative for COVID twice in 24 hours. As she said, it was a "roller coaster" day, as she literally lugged about 150 lbs of luggage through the port and up the gangways, through the testing site and finally to the check bag station. We'll see how much of that ends up getting shipped home after the voyage and before she begins her backpacking through Europe trip! She is delighted with her 3-person, outside cabin, and even more excited to have scored the top bunk (her first choice). She met her cabin-mates, Caroline and Madeline (see photo), but we have not learned much about them yet. Her cabin ... read more

Hooray! Maggie has successfully made it to Naples, Italy, and is staying at a hostel very near the port where she will embark on the Semester at Sea ship on January 5. In the meantime, she'll be touring around Naples, with a day-trip to Venice, between now and then with her two new friends and shipmates, Bella and Salma.... read more