I’m so excited to be arriving in Naples. I wish we had more time here. Because we have an excursion to Sorrento and Pompei we won’t see any of Naples. We will need to come back and stay in Naples and go to Capri. But for now, we board the bus for Sorrento. As usual, the port is very industrial. We can see bits of the old city of Naples and lots of the new industrial city. In the distance we can see Vesuvius. Our first stop is going to be at a Limoncello factory. Of course, we are on narrow roads in our big bus and there are lots of close calls. They have carved huge tunnels in the mountains so that we can get to Sorrento much easier. Our guide explains that the mountains are made of a beautiful white stone that looks like marble. So, they used that to build their towns and building. When we get to the Limoncello factory there are about nine other buses of tourists there. It’s like herding cattle. We enter, half the crowd heads to the bathroom (because it has been all of 40 minutes since we left the boat) and the rest of us walk through the factory and into the gift shop. They have everything from Limoncello to designer watches. We buy nothing!! Then head back to the bus. Our next stop is a small farm for some refreshments. It is a very cool little farm. Our bus can’t make it down the road so we are loaded into smaller vans for the trip. The driver has his little son with him and it makes us think of our grandson, Miles. We arrive at the farm and we are shown in to the tables. We are served water, wine, and a plate with bread, cheese, salami and olives. Turns out they make the cheese at the farm. One of the cheeses was a simple farm cheese and the other was mozzarella. They made it right there in front of us and gave us the recipe to make it. Also, they told us that Buffalo Mozzarella is made with the milk from water buffalo. Since there are no pastures big enough for water buffalo in Sorrento, our mozzarella was cow mozzarella. After we ate, they took us down to their gift shop!!! Big surprise! So anyway, I did buy a nice bowl with lemon candies in it and a bottle of Strawberrycello for Bill. We left the farm and were dropped in Sorrento for shopping, eating and whatever. Sorrento was very nice. We ate pizza and drank wine and had gelato, of course. We are eating our way through Italy and Greece!!
We got back on the bus and headed to Pompei. I am super excited about going to Pompei. I never thought I would get to go here. By the time we get to Pompei it is getting pretty hot outside. We park the bus and start our walk to the entrance of Pompei. Oops, no our first stop is a Cameo jewelry store. We meet the artisans and they give us a demonstration how the cameos are made. They also have a bunch of Sicilian coral jewelry, at 20 times what the GiVal jewelry store had it. So, as I’m leaving the store, my Swell falls out of my back pack and hits the marble floor and makes a huge clanging. I apologize my way out of the store and it’s time for gelato. No just kidding. We ate in Sorrento. We head into Pompeii. Our guide is really good and he is giving us a great tour. I just can’t imagine what happened here. So, when Vesuvius erupted and buried Pompeii, most of the people died of the poisonous gases before they were covered with about 80 feet of volcanic ash. They weren’t covered with lava, which is what I thought. It was ash and they were dead from the gases before they were buried. The eruption was documented by a survivor who wrote to his uncle in Rome and the letter was found in Rome. So, they know exactly the day and time it happened. There were some homes with Frescos still visible on the walls. The streets were made of great big stones and the streets were used as a sewer system. The original city of Pompeii wasn’t built by the Romans so they didn’t have indoor sewers. So, at the intersections of the roads, there were bigger taller stones so that people could cross the streets without getting their feet dirty in the poop. When it go too bad, they would uncork all the city fountains and the water would wash all the poop out of the city and into the fields where they grew their vegetables. Pretty ingenious. Our final stop in Pompeii was where they have the archived artifacts including the casts of the dead boy, dead dog and the dead man. So when they excavated and realized that there were hollow areas in the petrified volcanic ash, they carefully poured plaster in the openings and made casts of the vaporized people and animals. Unbelievable. I am so glad we went. Then it was back on the bus, off my aching feet and back to the ship. Shower and dinner then to bed and off the ship in the morning.
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