13th Oct – 21st Oct 2024
I feel that all our travels through the historic old towns and cities of Europe to date, and all our admiration of ancient churches, castles and streets and squares, has been preparing us for this part of this trip. Like runners preparing for a marathon, we have been in Old Sh*t training. We have put in the kilometers, our gaze has fallen upon many an olden thing. Are we now ready for the main event? We have seen ‘old’, but that was mostly late Middle Ages/Medieval/Renaissance old. Now we were going to experience ‘way older than that‘, and flipping loads of it. All at once. Lace up the shoes, Hampsons, it’s time to visit Rome and Pompeii.
I don’t know who else spent hours of classics lessons in their early teens learning about the tragedy that befell the town of Pompeii on 24th August 79 AD when Mount Vesuvius errupted burying the town under 6m of hot ash and pumice stone and annihilating all its inhabitants with toxic gas, but I did, and this place, and it’s history, is seared into my childhood soul. Nick felt the same. Of course we were going. That Pompeii is one of Italy’s most visited tourist destinations was the moderate downside that we were just going to have to deal with.
We booked a campsite almost next door to the main entrance of the ruins, or scavi as they are known here, and headed across the lower leg of the country to arrive in Pompeii, mid shin, on the Bay of Naples. To get here we had to pass by the Sorrento Peninsula, home of the Amalfi coast. This was a place that we would have loved to see but one that is just not practical in a motor home. Narrow, steep roads and a dearth of flat land make it better suited to a future trip in a convertible car.
As the motorway snaked its way towards the coast and to our destination there it was. Just there. Mount bl**dy Vesuvius! Just an everyday sight for all that live here in its shadow. But to us, a mythical thing. We arrived, installed in camp, and set about our plan of attack for our visit the next day. The reality of visiting the ruins is that unless you book some sort of tour, the queues are riduculous. The other reality is that there are about 57,000 outfits offering tours, of which only a few are highly recommended. We made our choice and booked on line. At the allotted time of our tour the next day we arrived at the meeting point, along with about 100 fellow tourers. This looked bad until we realised that the company had five tours in various languages all starting at the same time. Not so bad.
Our guide was a very tall, angular and dishy Italian chap called Vitale, who had no need of the ubiquitous tour guide prop of an jazzy umbrella or eye-catching scarf tied to the top of a long stick. We just followed his eye catching cheek bones and silky pony tail that soared a foot above the heads and shoulders of all us lesser mortals. Vitale was a font of Pompeii knowledge, it being his job n’all, and expertly guided us through the hoards of other tour groups and folk doing their own exploring, strangley managing to sweet talk us to the front of many queues controlled by lady docents. There was masses to see and a lot of information to take in, so I won’t even attempt to summarise it all here, just share a few factoids that stood out to me.
Did you know….
…that if the wind had been blowing the other way on the day of the erruption it would have been nearby Naples that copped it? As it happened, they barely had to bring the laundry in.
…that the ruins were only discovered in the late 1500s, major excavations only commenced in the mid 1700s and by the 1960s it had been significantly uncovered but then left to decay? There is a new area being excavated as we speak.
…that no actual bodies were found? Those had long since decomposed. What were left were hollow voids in solidified ash. The archeologists made plaster moulds of these, creating models of the people that died. For some reason it still felt weird to take any photos of them.
…that Mount Vesuvius had given plenty of warnings of an imminant erruption in the form of numerous earthquakes? A big one in 62AD had caused lots of damage and fires, leading to many buildings being in a state of partial repair at the time of the erruption and causing many people to have already left.
…that the Romans were quite preoccupied with the images of male genitalia? These were seen as a talisman for good luck and prosperity and were liberally used to decorate their homes. Obviously I had no scrupples about taking any photos of those.
…that inexplicably the brothel is one the most popular buildings of Pompeii with the tourists? It’s just a bunch of rooms, people. No plaster models of victims who died ‘in flagrante’ to be seen here.
…that Pompeii was once a port town, but the erruption changed the topography of the area and it is now 2km from the Bay of Naples?
The whole place is just so amazingly preserved. There are loads of beautiful and detailed frescos and countless excavated homes, restaurants, shops, temples, water fountains, roads, baths, the forum, the Basillica, an amphitheatre. It was also very apparent that the Romans were WAY ahead of the rest of Europe when it came to living standards and personal hygiene.
After our three hour tour ended we dragged our weary bones back to base and considered the rest of our day. It was 2pm. Option one: relax and do nothing. Option two: go to Sorrento in the late afternoon for a mooch around and an early dinner. Option two prevailed. Our well placed campsite was also a mere stone’s throw from the station and an hour and a half later we were on the very full, overheated, standing-room only train to Sorrento.
On arrival we gave the main areas of the old town our usual treatment of ‘walking about’, saw the quite unusual deep ravine right behind the main street that is the site of a now defunct water mill, and then set about finding a spot with a view for a sundowner drink. Lonely Planet did us proud again, leading us to the bar of Hotel Bellevue Syrene which had an amazing terrace and an epic view of the Bay of Naples and Mount Vesuvius.
Here we enjoyed the changing light as the sun disappeared behind us, watching the scuttle of boats returning from a day on the water, and drinking some delicious wine. It was very fancy with free nibbles and everything. We offset the sizeable drinks bill with a cheap and cheerful pizza dinner – we are nothing if not adaptable – and the train home, with excess pizza in hand, was another standing-room only affair. We were glad to get home and glad to have managed to have squeezed a little slice of the Amalfi coast into this trip.
From Pompeii we continued north to Rome, by-passing Naples on the way. This motorway journey was busy and frenetic, showcasing the Italian driving attitudes and skills in all their glory. The main facts of the case are: Lots of Italians drive small, economical cars. Perfect for whizzing around congested cities, not so good for making decisive overtaking manouvres or joining motorways at an adequate speed on the ridiculously short slip roads on Italian Autostrada. Italians also don’t worry too much about indicating. That would imply that they are aware that they may be someone behind them to indicate to. Italians handle a car as if it is a droplet of water in a river. The general dynamics of ‘flow’ past and around other objects is the ethos of their driving, rather than conventional ‘rules of the road’. Once these principles are embraced, stress levels whilst driving can fall. Nick is slowly managing to embrace these principles. And so to Rome!
Our Rome camp was a utilitarian place within spitting distance of a tram stop that meant that we were only 20 minutes from the centre of the city. Very handy. We had planned four nights here, so three full days to ‘do’ Rome. We spent the afternoon of our arrival day doing some planning and logistics. What to see. What not to see. Where to eat and when. We hit the guide books and the internet and made some decisions. The first, and hardest, decision was to part with a not inconsiderable amount of money to do a Vatican tour. Trying to see it ‘solo’ involves a lot of time spent in queues and we thought that we’d get much more out of it with the wisdom of a tour guide. This was going to be the one and only Vatican City visit in our lifetime. It was now or never. We bit the bullet and booked a tour for the next afternoon. The other sight that neeeded significant pre-planning for a visit was the Colosseum, next available tickets being the afternoon after that. We also booked a ticket and time slot to go into the Pantheon. All this organising and spending money on tickets and tours was exhausting and alien to our usual ‘wander and admire from the outside’ technique of sightseeing. We needed a lie down.
There is so much to see in Rome and much of what it has to offer is so ancient, so well preserved and so famous that it is quite overwhelming. There are obviously also many, many other people who are here for the same reason and this definitely creates crowds to be endured. We joined the salmon run.
The Vatican is a place of extremes. It is an extremely small country, with only 121 acres of land. It is extremely light on women with only about 5% of its 450 citizens being female. It has an extremely convoluted security and walking route to get in. It is extremely popular with about 6.7 million visitors per year. It is extremely full of priceless artifacts, paintings and sculptures, the collections amassed by various Pontifs thoughout the centuries who spent an extreme amount of money making the place look nice.
The Sistine Chapel was extremely beautiful but so full of people that there was ‘shuffling room’only. It was hard to find a spot to stand still so to be able to look at the frescos and Michelangelo’s famous pieces. Viewing was hard on the neck. The rules of ‘no noise and no photos’ was ignored by many, including me, and I was extremely naughty and took a quick snap. I felt that I had paid enough money and deserved one.
Our tour tickets ensured us a ‘back door’ entry to St Peter’s Basillica thus avoiding a long wait. This is the Catholic Church’s HQ, its flagship store, a main showroom. It is extremely massive. So big that the usual scale of a church or cathedral is lost. There is almost no seating meaning that the space is undefined and open, with huge spans and domes, sculptures and art. Of all of the tour, this was the most impressive bit. Our guide was not permitted to continue the tour inside, so she said her farewell and cut us loose at the enormous door so we could look around by ourselves. We did a loop and then headed for the exit across St Peter’s Square.
The Vatican had been interesting, but not worth what we had spent on the tour. As non-Catholics our visit had not been about faith or pilgrimage, it had been solely about seeing, and what struck me was the embarrassment of extreme wealth that had been tied up over the ages for the use, enjoyment and worship of so few. We wandered back to the tram stop via a rosé pit stop and headed home.
Day two in Rome was a biggie with many kilometers covered on foot. We started our day with a tram and then a bus ride across town to see the Pantheon. On the bus we met a young honeymooning couple from Texas who had come via Florence and Paris. He was bemoaning the lack of good beer in Italy and that the burgers in France weren’t as good as in Texas. We agreed with him wholeheartedly, whilst politely and subtley intimating that perhaps these countries have other marvels of food and drink to offer that might be different from those in Texas. Not sure if he got it. It was very hot and crowded on the bus so we got off early and walked.
The Pantheon. Classical facade with columns, amazing domed circular room. Lots of colourful marble everywhere. Nice and symmetrical. Loved it.
From here we set off across town towards the Forum passing, amongst other things, the Victor Emmanuel ll Monument, aka The Vittoriano/The Typewriter/The Wedding Cake, a veritable spring chicken of a magnificent construction having only been finished in 1935. It is one of Italy’s national monuments dedicated to the first king of a united Italy and houses the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier.
We passed the Largo di Torre Argentina, an archeolgical site uncovered in 1929 that was 20 ft below street level and has the remains of four ancient Roman temples and the site of the Theatre of Pompy, where Julius Caesar was murdered in 44BC. Now it is a cat santuary in which about 200 cats are cared for. All just lying around amongst the ancient ruins, being fed by volunteers. ‘Et Tu, Kitte?’
The Forum is madness. A large gap in the fabric of modern time and space where an ancient Roman time portal sits. It is a massive swathe of the ruins of buldings and arches and columns and squares and temples and roads and ramps and steps and shops. Here was the heart of the city for many centuries. Built and rebuilt, modified and renovated, added to and demolished. A place to meet, trade, govern, judge and worship. Just here. The ancient past poking its head into our present. All those people from the past getting on with their lives in their own present with no idea that we would be so captivated by what they had built, and left behind, so far into the future. Sometimes I get overwhelmed by history.
We did a bit of the Palatine Hill and then needed a sit down and a sandwich which revived us sufficiently to continue cruising around, soaking up more Old Sh*t that I don’t even know the names of. It was everywhere. Ruin here, ruin there. An arch way! A column! A temple! Here was a market place. Over there was a palace. All over the blimin’place. Good job we had trained for this.
Throughout the day we were repeatedly approached by hawkers selling identical bracelets. All young African men, all with the same patter. ‘Nice shoes! Where are you from?’ ‘Have a bracelet for free, I’m celebrating – my wife just had a baby yesterday!’ Classic, basic sales psychology that they obviously all learnt from the same person for whom they were working. It must get results though. We passed many a tourist sporting a wristful of bracelets or being encouraged to look at a photo on a phone that I am sure was a generic newborn baby. We started preempting the patter by complimenting them on their shoes first.
Finally our late afternoon time slot for our Colosseum visit had arrived and we headed there. This is another place that is an ancient history lesson hard-hitter with near mythical status and consequently another very popular spot. We joined the procession around its walls and paid a little extra to be able to get onto the central arena area. It is hugely impressive and we were able to appretiate it in the golden hour of the day. I felt the history time warp here too, being conscious of the past presence of all the people who had sat here and watched the gladiatorial spectacles and all the lives lost for their entertainment. I am a logical, practical scientist type, but sometimes I get a bit adrift on the time contiuum.
Post colosseum we found a bar nearby and had a much welcome sit down and aperitif before walking to our final appointment of the day: dinner at Trattoria Morgana, another Anthony Bourdain destination. We spent the entire meal chatting with our closely situated table neighbour, an Australian called Tess. She too was on a Bourdain pilgrimage and was very good company. The highlight of the meal was a starter of fried octopus on a bed of warm hummus with fresh rosemary. Unexpectedly wonderful. Then we went home, but not before exchanging contact details with Tess and threatening to visit her next time we were in Melbourne.
Day three in Rome took us past the small church of Santa Maria della Vittoria to see a renown sculpture called The Ecstasy Of St Theresa by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. This was beautiful with some delightfully kitch golden rays of light reflecting some actual rays of sunlight coming from a hidden skylight. Artistic genius.
We continued up to and through the park of Villa Bourgese and past the National Gallery of Modern Art. We were going to go in, as an antidote to all the Old Sh*t, but decided we didn’t have the cerebral cortex space spare for any major inputs. Confusingly it is located in the the quite old, 17th century building of a former Barefoot Carmelite monastery.
Our wanderings had a lunch purpose from here and the committment to our Anthony Bourdain fandom thinks nothing of making a 4km walking detour to eat at one of his destinations. This time it was ‘Ciaco e Pepe’, an eatery named after its most popular dish. Translating to ‘cheese and pepper’ this simple yet delicious dish comprises solely of spaghetti, or its fatter cousin, tonnarelli, combined with grated pecorino romano and black pepper. The place sold vats of the stuff, rapidly serving up generous €10 portions on a jolly and busy pavement terrace. ‘Fast food’, Roman-style, with a wine on the side of course.
From here (here being a random residential district) we headed back towards the snake pit of the tourist destinations. We headed along, and then over, the River Tiber, then along to Piazza del Popolo, The People’s Square. One of the ancient, main gateways of the city, formerly Flamina, laterly Porta del Popolo stands here. Pilgrims and traders arriving to Rome on the Via Flamina, a road built in 220 BC to link Rome with the Adriatic Sea, entered the city here. Seriously Old Sh*t. The crowds increased as the modern day Via Flamina led us to The Spanish Steps and then we really braced ourselves for a visit to the Trevi Fountain. This suprised me. It was much bigger and more impressive than I had imagined, the scale of it being a bit distorted by the fact that it is in quite a small square. It also was not the Trevi Fountain, it was the Trevi Sculpture, having being emptied for cleaning and maintenance over the Autumn. We tossed no coins and made no wishes. Next summer you will need to book a ticket and time slot to see it.
Finally we headed back towards our tram stop, past the Piazza Venezia, more ruins (or were they the same ruins from yesterday – I wasn’t sure at this point) and went home. We were pooped. We had ‘done’ Rome. Our feet had done about 36km over three days. Our brains were full of facts and mental images. We had taken all the requisite photos. We had eaten some excellent Italian food (they just call it food here). We had sampled the public transport. We had observed the city driving (small cars, lots of them, mostly Smart cars and Fiat Pandas, mostly dented, can park anywhere). We were ready to move on.
There was just one more small thing to do before we left Rome. After all, it was a Saturday morning, so we all know what that means! We saddled up early, and despite the heavy rain, my lovely husband pretended that he was driving a Fiat Panda and bashed through the narrow streets of some suprisingly-busy-considering-it-was-8am-on-a-Saturday-morning residential areas to take me to one of Rome’s two Parkruns. We found the the last available and suitable parking space within a 1km radius of the start, pulled out the coats and umbrellas, and headed to the park. It was a bit of a mud-fest, but the field of 60-odd gave it a good buzz and I puddle-jumped my way round whilst chatting to a German girl, also called Sara. The rain stopped soon after the start so Nick didn’t get too miserable whilst he waited for me and after a quick car park below-knee hose-off we were on our way again.
We headed north into Tuscany and to a curious place that warranted a small detour. Near a village called Saturnia, in the middle of the hills, fields and forests, lies a strange place called Saturnia Hot Springs. As the name might suggest, this is a thermal area, but is unusually fed by a hot cascade rather than a hot spring that bubbles up from below. Consequently it has formed a series of very scenic, terraced hot pools that are hard to describe. It was also hard to take a decent photo, so I have borrowed one from the interweb to show you.
Miraculously it is free, refreshingly undeveloped and although can get busy, there was plenty of space for everyone in a pool somewhere. The pools closer to the waterfall were hotter but busier, so we found an empty pool half way up the terraces and compromised a little on the perfect temperature. There are some lockers and changing rooms but most folk just dumped their bags on the rough banks and then squelched back to the carpark in their towels and wet cozzies. Our camp was about 1.5km away, and plenty of people were walking down to the pools in their robes from where we were. Perfectly normal in this neck of the woods. The nearby village of Saturnia, perched on its hilltop, also got a visit from us. It had the usual offerings of old church, some Roman relics, a quaint square, an old fort and some shops, but lurking amongst the handful of bistros and cafes was a small, unassuming steak restaurant that had found its way onto the list of ‘The best 100 steak restaurants in the world’. Fancy that!
We had a couple of nights here, enough to gather our thoughts after our frenetic city exploits and to give us a little taste of Tuscany, which was the next focus of our trip.