Pompei, and climbing a volcano

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From Roma, down south to the west-coast town of Napoli. Decided to take my chances, and call the Napolese man (Pasquale) I met on the plane from Bangkok- and boy did I hit the jackpot! Was put up in a hotel room for the two nights I was there, wined and dined (yes, I too was wondering what exactly he expected in return...luckily for me he was just a nice, generous guy...I think...), and driven around all day. Bloody sweeeeeet as!! 😉
Now, the only reason I was interested in going south, which is a total detour from anyplace else I want to visit in Italy, was to check out Pompei. Some of you may have heard of it. It was once a bustling ancient civilisation, that was rather unfortunately located at the base of the volcano, Vesuvius. Silly town planners.
So you can see where this story is headed- it sure doesn't have a happy ending! In about the 3rd century AD (453 or something like that), Vesuvius errupted, engulfing the town in lava, thus leaving the ruins we see today lying in its wake. Anyways, I like ancient stuff- Egyptian stuff, Roman stuff, and whatnot. Ruins of sorts. And I really was interested in seeing solidified people. Yes, a bit sadistic of me I guess, but hey, each to their own!
However, I was rather thoroughly disappointed in what I found. It was seriously just a bunch of ruins! B-O-R-I-N-G!! No solidified people ANYWHERE! What is the world coming to? Right. After I got over that initial disappointment, I imagined what it would have been like back in the day, and ok, it turned out to be pretty impressive. Still disappointing though...
Oh, and just off the topic, they were selling the biggest lemons I've EVER seen outside the entry gates. Seriously, these things must have been on steroids or something, 'cos they were about the size of my head. I only with I'd remembered to take a photo...damn.
Pompei done, and I had my sights set on Vesuvius, the now dormant volcano responsible for the state of this city. So up to the crater we climbed. Again, a rather big disappointment. Everything up there was blanketed in dense fog, so that the only thing I could see was a landslide of pebbles into the mouth of the crater. Big whoop. I was really tempted to be patriotically Aussie and perform the ritualistic call of "COOOOO-EEEEEE" from the top of the volcano, but due to fears that I might set off the next volcanic erruption (I could smell sulphur gas being emitted from somewhere within, which was not at all comforting!), I restrained myself.

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