Tuesday, September 5, 2000
We had to set an alarm for 6:40 am in order to make the main
dining room breakfast and get to our tour to Pompeii on time (the
last organized tour of the trip, yahoo). We changed into our
substitute wedding bands (plain silver) since crime is common in
Naples, and headed to the tour. The bus took us on a detour to a
cameo making school/shop which was annoying. It felt like a tour bus
stopping for Bird's Nest Soup in Indonesia. The cameos were neat
(carvings in sea shells made into jewelry) but we didn't look
seriously out of principle for being stuck there by a tour bus. We
got back on the bus after a quick potty/water break and there were 2
other couples already on the bus. They were also miffed at the forced
shopping trip (which, by the way, the elder tour participants just
loved). We ended up hanging out with this quartet for the rest of the
day and beyond in the cruise. It turned out they had the same idea as
us to ditch the tour bus in Pompeii and take the train to Sorrento
and then make our way to Naples by hydrofoil.
The tour of Pompeii was interesting. We were able to get much more
of a feel for a complete city than any other place of ruins. However
we were a little tired of looking at rocks (like Ephesus and Athens).
The tour guide was good but not very enthusiastic. We toured maybe a
half or a third of the city which was plenty for us since that took a
half a day anyway. Mount Vesuvius looms in the background.
Courthouse in Pompeii. Jails were
under the grates.
The main courtyard. The two stories
of columns on the left originally went all the way around the
courtyard.
Jill in front of the courtyard and
Mt. Vesuvius
Mt. Vesuvius through the
ruins
A particularly well restored
mosaic
Inside a Roman bath
The biggest surprise was the house of some rich family that had
several frescoes painted directly on the walls that were recovered
when the city was found. One in particular was extremely
complimentary of the subject's male privates while another painting
made it clear we were in the bedroom and what acts take place there.
It appears pornography is very old! It was very amusing to watch the
old ladies come out of the small room with the most graphic
paintings. That was more fun than seeing the paintings themselves. We
did at the end get a glimpse of the plaster casts of people that were
stopped dead in their tracks.
A cast made of one of the
victims
Another victim of the
eruption
The edge of the city of
Pompeii
After the tour we hopped the community train to Sorrento (the
start of the famous Amalfi coast of Italy). The train was rickety and
reminded us of the Paris subway except above ground. It stopped a few
time along the way so it took over an hour to reach Sorrento. The
tracks ran behind apartment buildings and small gardens so we got
some sense of how poor some of the people really are (relative to
America) and how they live.
A picturesque street in
Sorrento
We had planned to take the hydrofoil from Sorrento to the the
Island of Capri but out plans changed. We formally introduced
ourselves to Scott, Carrie, Bridget, and Jim and decided to all 6 eat
lunch together. Lunch took a while so we decided we would stick
around and enjoy Sorrento and not rush a trip to Capri. Actually we
decided we could save that trip for next time we visit Italy! Lunch
was pizza (good) and a bottle of Chianti (even better) and
crème de carmel for dessert (even better yet).
Post lunch the 6 of us took a stroll through Sorrento, stopping
for Bridget to buy postcards. We can on to a square with a liquor
store so we went in and sampled free lemonciello (lemon liquor that
we were fond of from our last trip) and then of course purchased a
small bottle. From here we started walking down the cliff, enjoying
the views along the way, to the hydrofoil pier.
The coastline of Sorrento
View of Sorrento from the
pier
Sorrento is a quaint little seaside town built up into a cliff.
It's very picturesque. We bought tickets for 3:30 but no hydrofoil
showed up so we hopped the one at 4:30. We were just a slight bit
nervous about making it back to the ship but in the end we got back
right in time for sailaway. We didn't see much of Sorrento since we
spent part of the afternoon worrying about the hydrofoil reliability.
Leaving Sorrento by ferry
After dinner we met Scott & Carrie and Jim & Bridget for
the show in the Princess Theater. Jim had already scoped out seats in
the 5th row (I'm not fond of the front on live shows, you can't walk
out as easily as in the back). The first act was a multi instrumental
guy with a banjo and a violin that did a decent rendition of Cotton
Eye Joe. Next was the obviously gay acrobatic/contortion/dance team
David and Aris. It had an extreme homosexual undertone (which I think
flew right by the older theater patrons) and we felt like we were in
a San Francisco community theater. Aris did some acrobatic thing for
15 minutes which was based on him being scantily clad and hanging
from a couple of velvet ropes near the ceiling. We could have killed
Scott for sticking us in the 5th row. The best defense was to close
our eyes and forget about where the idea for that act probably came
from. The next scene was David dressed as Heidi lip syncing to
yodeling and trying to milk a cow and churn butter. At least the
props were a cow and butter. We laughed hard enough to cry at this
act. The final show was a young juggler named David Lynch and he was
excellent. He actually made the show worth while. |
