#3064 The Trip: Salerno/Pompeii

ussie in Pompeii, Italy

We now begin the cruise portion of The Trip, seven nights, six ports, beginning in the port of Rome, which is in Civitavecchia, and ending in Ravenna, which is a couple of hours from Venice. We had a driver to take us from Rome to Civitavecchia. The driver and MT chatted the whole way, about 90 minutes. I think MT was very pleased to have someone to talk to other than T and I. LOL That first day, we just stayed on the ship, staking out our favorite area on the pool deck where we would return each day of the cruise. We left late in the afternoon, and in the morning, we had arrived in Salerno, Italy.

view of Salerno from the ship

Salerno is in southeastern Italy, and is the gateway to the Amalfi Coast. From Salerno there are many options for day trips, including Sorrento, the Amalfi Coast, Naples, and Pompeii. We chose to go to Pompeii. The allure of seeing the ruins of this ancient city was really strong. This was one of the few excursions we booked from the ship, but we didn't make a very good choice. We booked the "Pompeii on Your Own" which basically just gave us a ride to Pompeii and back. Once we got to Pompeii, we had to pay to get into the archaeological site and figure our way around the place. We would have been better off to spend the extra money for a real tour. We did get audio guides, but we really didn't use them. The site is huge.

map at the Pompeii archaeological site

There was no way we were going to see much of it in the two hours we had, but the audio guide desk gave us a map and told us about some places we could see in the time we had. We did see cool stuff, and I'm just going to show some photos I took. Sadly, I do not know anything about these places, other than I thought they were amazing. These walls and floors were buried under ash and volcanic debris for nearly 1700 years. The fact that you can see anything at all is mind-blowing to me. 

frescos!

details and colors

zoomed in photo of the little image from the photo above this one

look at the floor!

the detail!

a temple for Isis

amphitheater

pano of the street

pottery

It was extremely hot in Pompeii the day we were there. I'm glad it wasn't rainy, though. I saw some video of rainy Pompeii, and it was kind of scary. Those stone roads are a bit slippery even when they are dry and with the rain, they looked like rivers. Another thing about Pompeii is that there are lots of hills and steps and not much is even footing. I saw some older folks really struggling to get around there.

Tonight T and I watched a show on Disney + called Pompeii: Out of Time with Tom Hiddleston. What I liked about the show was that Hiddleston was trying to help us remember that the people in Pompeii in 79 AD were real people. He focused on three individuals who historians and archaeologists know were in Pompeii on that day and he imagined what their life might have been like and what they went through. It's just three episodes, and I was a little skeptical at first but then I was into it. Worked out perfectly that I was planning to write about Pompeii tonight anyway!

I feel like we missed out here by being cheap. I'd love to go back someday to take a tour and be able to spend as much time as I want on the site. Excavation is still being done, and I think more cool stuff will be found. I'd like very much to go to the museum in Naples, and if I'm in the area anyway, it would be awesome to go to Herculaneum. Ahh...maybe someday.

When we got back to Salerno, we decided that we needed to have pizza since we were so close to Naples (you know, where pizza was invented.) The guide on the bus told us that pizza is serious business in Salerno, so we found a nice-looking restaurant not far from the waterfront that had outdoor seating, and ordered pizzas. My pizza was the signature pizza, Giagiu: The Dream. It was a white pizza with mozzarella, yellow cherry tomatoes, pecorino, Cilento bacon and Cilento extra virgin olive oil, finished with coffee powder and "coffee air." How could I possibly pass on coffee air?

my pizza at Giagiu

See that foamy brown stuff in the middle where the knife is pointing? That is the coffee air. It was basically really light coffee foam. It actually tasted really good with the cheese and the salty bacon. After lunch we got a gelato and walked along the promenade back to the ship. We had a nice day!

Next time, join me to hear about walking around Catania, Sicily. 

xo