Pompeii Monday

Today was the day...I had been looking forward to it for a very long time! We got to go to Pompeii!

We woke at 7:30 AM to catch a train at 9:30 AM. Usually in other countries, waking up this early wasn't necessary. In Rome...it is. We learned this from our first night going to the Vatican. Traveling anywhere in Rome takes an unusually long amount of time. Our host left us delicious muffins for breakfast! They have been amazing! We grabbed them to go and headed out the door by 8:00 AM...and waited at the bus stop for at least twenty minutes. At least it wasn't too warm this morning. When the bus arrived, it was already crowded with too many people. We shoved ourselves on! I hate when shoving is necessary...and it always seems to be necessary in Rome.

One of the reasons I will not miss Rome and caused me to have absolutely no desire to come back!

After riding on the illegally full bus for thirty minutes. Finally, enough people got off in order to breathe...for the last five minutes. No one likes to be rubbed up against in a hot stinky bus...especially for thirty minutes.

We made it to Rome Termini main station with twenty minutes to spare. After getting to our train, we had ten minutes before we left and hopped on the train. Close call...even with leaving an hour and a half in advance.

The train ride was fine. We sat next to a nice family on their way to Sorrento. They talked very highly of it...as do many people we talk to in Italy. I think we will have to plan another trip to Italy for the Amalfi Coast. I just hope it's as good as they say! Also on our train ride was a very loud argument...something about a reserved seat and someone didn't want to move. It went on for a good five minutes and then was eventually settled. It was scary for a little bit as everything sounds a little scary in Italian.

After two hours, our train pulled into Naples. I was already nervous after hearing from Kevin's dad that the pickpockets are good here and a lady from the train was telling us she had earrings and a family broche stolen while she was wearing it...that is really impressive! So yes, I was nervous.

We found the ticket office for our transfer to Pompeii, this train also went to Sorrento...everyone and their mom was on this train. Again with the overcrowding. This train took about 35 minutes to Pompeii, with us standing the whole time. While standing, s lady from Argentina was telling me how they had just gotten robbed. Their passports and credit cards were taken from her husband's pocket...they had not heard about the thievery that is Naples. I felt so sad for them. If only they had been prepared.

Our stop for Pompeii finally arrived and we got off, leaving plenty of people still on the train. It wasn't hard to find the ticket office, just follow the signs. The entrance fee is 11 euros per person and they give you a free map and mini book guide! Really nice. We made it to Pompeii around 1 pm and stayed for about 4 hours. I'm sure we could have easily stayed longer, but we didn't want to miss our train back to Rome.

As soon as you buy your ticket and go through the gates, you are in the ruins of the city. It was incredible how well preserved everything is here, it really is a city frozen in time!  You walk into the city on the main ancient road, pretty awesome! To the left off of the road, you can see the wall remains of hundreds of rooms and buildings! When the volcano erupted, the ash piled up on the roofs and eventually caved them in, but most of the walls are left standing!

One of the first areas you can go in is an ancient temple...the Temple of Apollo. Parts of the statues are still remaining, as well as most of the pillars.

Next, you walk into the giant and open forum! This was basically the city center, and even had government buildings! The volcano erupted in 79 a.d., but even then, they had a plumbing system, and running water with aqueducts! It was amazing to see the technology they were able to use in building their city! As you walk along the streets, you will notice 1, 2, or 3 taller blocks in the road that are sidewalk height. These were used by the people when they would flood the street to clean it. People could cross them and not get their feet wet. They were also kind of like modern day speed bumps. It was cool seeing the grooves between the stones of where the chariots/wagons used to go. Also, one side represented a one way street...two stones equals a two way street...and three stones was a busy road! Pretty awesome!

I forgot to mention that mount Vesuvius looms just behind the city! It's crazy because a huge chunk of the top blew of during the eruption, and you can still easily see where it used to be!

Continuing our walk, we went south, and saw two ancient theaters! One was larger than the other, but they were both very impressive! Behind the large theater, they have a training field and barracks for the gladiators! Next we walked over to Pompeii's version of the Colosseum! It held about 20,000 people, which is quite a bit less than Rome's Colosseum, but what made this one cool is that you could walk out into the arena where the gladiators fought!

We headed back to the forum, since there was still a lot to see. The city of Pompeii is huge, and if you want to see it all, I would say you need a full day! And the crazy part is that less than half of Pompeii has been excavated! There is still more to discover! A few people told us it only takes an hour to tour Pompeii...this is a joke!

Back at the forum, we went into a Roman style bath house called the Stabian Baths! They had different rooms for different styles of baths, like cold, hot, steam... and in one of the rooms, they had two bodies! Well, the concrete mixed with bodies! In the 1700's when they started excavation, they discovered hollow spaces, where bodies had decayed, so they filed it with a concrete plaster, which is what you can see when you visit! It was amazing the amount of detail you could see on the faces, and the positions of the bodies as they were covered and frozen in time.

Back in the forum, we saw several more bodies, as well as the cast of a dog that had died in the eruption as well. Who leaves their dog behind?? We next continued on to see Pompeii's largest house, which had over 40 rooms! This was called the House of the Faun.

By this time, Kevin and I were both tired, and starting to worry if we would make our train back to Rome, since it always takes longer than expected to travel in Italy. We hurried and saw as much as we could on the way out, but sadly we missed the bakery, the brothel, and the garden of fugitives, which has several casts of bodies all grouped together. These are easy to see among the other things and can be found near the theater area...We just neglected to look for it on the map and guidebook, thinking we would happen upon them. That didn't happen. Live and learn...check your guidebook for things you want to see before you just walk around. Anyways, it was still awesome! Gives me a reason to come back to Pompeii!

We exited Pompeii and made our way back to the train station. The train picked us up from Pompeii around 5:15 and we made it to Naples central station around 6 PM. Our medium speed train had been delayed 45 minutes. We decided to catch the slower train as we figured that one would get us to time first.

As we waited, we had dinner...McDonald's. I wasn't about to trust anything in Naples...after seeing youth wearing skimpy clothes, including males, and youth smoking in the train station. I felt like I had just stepped into Jersey shore. We kept our bag close and I kept Kevin closer. McDonald's was great and reliable and filled our tummies. We then got on our train at 6:50 PM and headed to Rome.

The train was nearly three hours long...if you have the extra money, pay for the high speed train from Rome to Naples that takes only one hour. We didn't care to do this as getting in later didn't matter to us. I had more time than money :-) the train pulled into Rome about 9:30 pm.

As we head to Bern the next day, we needed to make reservations to Milan and then to Bern. The ticket line closed at 10 pm, and when we got there, there was s long enough line that would prohibit us from getting our tickets tonight. There was a lady that actually worked for the ticket company telling people we would have to come back tomorrow. Then there was a creepy, skinny, tattooed, stinky guy with a pen on the other side trying to "help" people out in the line by offering them the SELF SERVICE machines. I capitalized that for a reason. The previous day I had watched a similar situation with a guy like this "help" other people at the self service as he stood by them and surely copied down some information...like eurail code or card number. I had come too far to get tricked and robbed from now. He tried talking to us, followed us a little bit...Kevin was nice, I walked away hearing too many stories of these con artists. Kevin picked up what was going on and we left.

Our train would be leaving at 8 AM, and we decided just to be back before then. Our bus was at the station and took us home. We showered, went to bed, and set out alarm for 6 AM...leaving Rome as soon as we could. I have liked being here, but I haven't loved it. Maybe others will have a different experience than I, but I loved countries way more than here where I felt safe, clean, and not stressed by overcrowding and late and long transportation.

Ta ta for now!

Another Day in Rome...Vatican, Catacombs, and the Villa Borghese

This was our third day in Rome. We started by having a cereal breakfast left by our amazing hosts. After breakfast we headed out to the Vatican city. It was a Sunday, and on Sunday the Vatican museums are free from 9-12:30 PM. We had already been though, so our destination was St Peter's Basilica.

This morning I learned for myself that I was over Rome. I didn't need to come back. I'm seeing all I want in these three days, and if I don't come back ever...I would be completely happy! I don't even need to see the completed trevi fountain.

As I got on another hot and stinky bus, with tight standing room only space...people rubbing all against me it was so crowded...the romance and attraction to Rome was gone. I wanted so badly to be back in Sweden, or Austria, or even Germany in that moment.

Anyways, after waiting 15 minutes for a bus and riding said bus for 30 minutes...We made it to the main train station, Termini, where we caught another overcrowded train to Vatican city. Not only were the museums free today, being the last Sunday of the month, but the pope was speaking at noon.

We made it to the Vatican around 11:15, and stood in line for the Basilica. It was hot, the line was long, and people were trying to cut. We had fun and took pictures anyways! The Vatican center started filling up as it got closer to noon. At 11:45, cheers roared as the pope 's tapestry rolled out from a window. The line moved forward, we were almost to security, when noon struck and the pope appeared! Crowds roared as he spoke in Italian. The people quieted to listen. It was quite a cool experience. We went through security around 12:10, and from our viewpoint, we could see the pope from his window. He looked very small from where we were, even though we were closer than anyone in the Vatican! Luckily, there were large screens of the pope in convenient places, and he was miked so people could hear him. Good timing for us!

 See the Pope Tapestry? I said it was small :)

We then went into the Basilica, passing people with shorts on as they are not allowed in the church. So sad! As we entered, you immediately see the huge altar for st Peter. However, we were there for the La Peita! The statute of Mary holding the crucified Christ. It was beautiful and better than I could've ever imagined. The marble work and emotion seeping from the sculpture was just spectacular. It almost felt real, like I went back in time and watched this happen. This is a must see! If you venture to Rome just for this, the Colosseum, and the Roman forum...it would be totally worth the crowds! All this made it with it. As we walked away, we saw more statues of pope 's than Christ, kind of sad considering this was a church. We even saw the tombs of three dead popes...with the tombs have clear glass in front so you could see the preserved bodies. The older they were, the darker their skin...but they were still very well preserved! We then made our way to st Peter's tomb. However, as it was Sunday...mass was going on and you could not walk up to it. We admired from afar, knowing that we had already seen the best thing there. After spending over an hour here, pondering and looking, we decided it was time to leave.

From the Vatican, we went and got lunch! Two delicious paninis, with the best combination of bread, salami, and cheese. We refilled our water bottles with the refreshing water fountains placed around Rome.

Our next destination was castle San Angelo. This used to house the urns of Hadrian and his family...dating back to about 2000 years ago. The urns are no longer there, and no one knows what happened to them, but the building is still in great shape. About a millennium after Hadrian had built his part, different pope 's added onto the structure. The coolest part about the castle was the great views of the city and the walkway here connecting the Vatican and the castle. It was used by a pope to run from the Vatican to the castle to hide when the city was under attack. The pope his in the castle for seven months until he was safe. So cool! However, from the information we got, it sounds like they only open the walkway for people to walk on at night...sometimes. We admired the walkway from afar.

 That...my friends...is a dead pope. There were three of them and it was crazy!!

See the runway below? That connects to the Vatican!

 In the Castle!

 The view!

 A knight with GOOD protection!

 Kevin's ready to run down the Pope walkway

Next, we headed near the trevi fountain to the Capuchin church. Here is a crypt with bones of friars and monks...or what other people would call catacombs...not them though, so don't get confused. This is one of the few places in Rome that still have bones in their catacombs. From what I've found, most places in Rome have emptied their catacombs, but you can still enter them to see. The great thing about this church is that it is a hidden gem for crazy people like me...with very few tourists! Also, you need to cover your knees here, just like st Peter's. I had to put my pants back on for here. You walk through the museum of the friars first and then enter the crypts! There are five rooms with bones, each with a different theme. The room of skulls, thighs, pelvis'...whatever! They are all cool. Also, everything down there was made from bones...all the designs, chandeliers, bones everywhere...even some of the dead friars were posed in standing positions! Kevin and I were trying to figure out if the person who made this was just an artist...or crazy. Either way, I'm glad it was made because we got to appreciate it.

No pictures are allowed here, but we tried to take some anyways. They turned out okay...We ended up just buying a postcard of the crypt at the end of the tour.

From here, our next destination was the villa borghese. After having walked and being on our feet for about 5 hours in the extreme heat, we were getting pretty tired. As we entered the park...We had no idea where to go and honestly we were too tired to walk very far. We found a"grassy" area where I slipped off my pants...I had shorts on underneath for those with dirty minds :-) and we sat for a little bit until ants sent us away. There was a bus on the park that we hopped on, hoping it would take us to a cool place in the park...it didn't...not surprising as the busses suck. There were some cool things we passed along the way, but had no desire to walk back to.

We exited the park, feeling perfectly satisfied with what we saw. Then stopped to get some delicious gelato...possibly the best so far followed by the lindt store gelato. We got a mixture of strawberry and dark chocolate gelato! Spectacular after a long and hot day!

Before heading home, we went into another square nearby the villa. It looked Egyptian, with two churches side by side in the square! Very cool. After walking enough, we caught the overcrowded metro and headed home. Next was the awful bus. When we got to our stop, we found a kebab wrap for dinner. It was unique as the shop also put French fries in the wrap! Very good!

We arrived home around 8 PM, tired with hurt feet, but relaxed after a nice shower. I will not miss Rome, but I have seen some great things. Tomorrow is Pompeii! Can't wait :-)

Ta ta for now!