Pompei

We had ambitious plans for today.  Train to Pompei at "O-dark-thirty".  Climb Mt. Vesuvius.  Visit the ruins of Pompei.

The italian train system was a bit more to form in terms of timeliness.  Our train to Naples was 15 minutes late leaving Rome.  Normally not a big deal but when you run to your connection and see it pulling away, it becomes a bigger deal.  It meant we had to spend an extra hour at the Naples train station.  Train stations have never been my favorite places to hang.  (Read previous post on odours.)  Naples is a gritty  town.  We had our first experience with gypsy folks.  Very indirect, but they harassed and dirtied the café we went to for a hot chocolate and snack to burn some time.

We've found hot chocolate to be rather different here.  It was so thick today that the spoon would rest on the surface.  We had to request more milk and put more sugar in it to make it palatable.

That hour got us thinking about our ambitious plan.  As we rode to Pompei, Vesuvius loomed in the background.  The cold weather of the past couple of weeks left it snowcapped.  Today's temps were again in the single digits.  As sunny as it was, we just couldn't make the climb.  JJ is still coughing and there is still a chill in the older bones.  We didn't come prepared for a climb in the snow.  We checked into our B&B and headed for the site which is about 5 minute walk from our place.

Spent the whole afternoon going thru the ruins.  Pretty cool place and the kids had a good time.  Ran out of space on our camera and joe had to clean up so we could get thru the last couple days.  It seems Grace is a pigeon paparazzi because during her time with the camera yesterday, we had at least 20 bird shots.  Rod seemed more interested in taking closeups of peoples eyes or nostrils. JJ does not partake in the photographic arts.  Joe seems to take two of everything.

Got back to the room and took a bit of a rest before dinner, but apparantly not long enough.  Went out for food around 645 and all the real restaurants were still closed.  We settled on a pizza joint and had some nice pie, but it was not exactly what we wanted when heading out.  On our way back we stopped for gelati and saw that restaurants were finally coming to life at 730.

Heading to Capri tomorrow.

Quote of the day:  "To bad that volcano had to destroy the place."  JJ after hearing that the house we were in was that of a prosperous person and would have been quite elegant in its day.