Walking the Streets of Pompeii June 3, 2012

A street in Pompeii

I can’t remember exactly when I first learned about the tragic fate of the famous city of Pompeii, but I remember looking at those fascinating images of a city frozen in time and thinking “I want to go there someday. I want to walk those streets.” Up until our trip to Italy this spring, I had never been any further south in Italy than Rome. When the Mr. proposed we visit the island of Ischia, it didn’t take long for me to figure out that we would be fairly close to Pompeii.

We weren’t quite sure how to fit a visit to the city into our plans. We originally were going to finish up the trip by taking the train from Naples to Pompeii early in the morning, see the site and spend the night somewhere in the area before making our way back up north by train. When we discovered that you could do an organized day trip to Pompeii from Ischia, we thought that sounded like the easier option and what would make the most sense given that we would be on the island for 11 nights. We’d have plenty of time to fit a day trip in.

What I didn’t count on was that when it came time to book the day trip, the Mr. would balk at the 5.45 am pick up time and bail on me. Actually, in some ways, splitting up for the day made a lot of sense as the Mr. wanted to tackle Mount Epomeo on Ischia, and I really didn’t want to do that. I’m not much of a mountain climber, and the Mr. also wasn’t really certain how easy and accessible the path would be from where he wanted to hike up (and it turned out it was a good thing I didn’t go as the path wasn’t so easy in places). So I decided I’d sign up for the day tour to Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius on my own with a company that offers tours in both Italian and German. I hoped maybe I’d be able to follow the German a bit, but I was also realistic enough to know that there would be a good chance I wouldn’t understand so much if it was a non-native speaker doing the talking (and yep, I understood maybe 10% of what our bus driver\guide said).

Unfortunately there was no tour offered that went only to Pompeii, so the other disappointment about the tour was that we would have only a couple of hours on the site to explore before we’d head on to Mount Vesuvius. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see Vesuvius, I just would have preferred to have had the better part of a day to take in Pompeii. It’s actually a fairly large site (it was a city, after all) and although it hasn’t been entirely excavated yet,  one could easily spend an entire day walking around. But doing a day tour from Ischia and back again means you can only fit in so much, especially when the tour includes a second stop.

The Temple of Apollo

We were picked up at literally the crack of dawn by a bus, loaded onto the ferry, journeyed over to Naples and then had to hop on a bus to get to Pompeii. I was a little torn about what to do when we arrived. There was a guide who had been hired to lead our group around, and although I could understand her a little better than the bus driver, I wasn’t sure whether I should stay with the group or break off my own. My frustration was that we had such a short amount of time to see Pompeii, and she talked about each of the stops in both German and Italian, wasting (from my point of view) precious minutes. And even though I had an audio guide with English, it was sometimes difficult to figure out exactly where we were, find the right number, and punch it in.  And then the recording would finish and I would be standing there, straining to make out bits of German as the guide talked on, sharing bits of information and stories that weren’t on the audio guide. I couldn’t usually understand enough to make me want to stay, but after wandering off my own a couple of times I actually got a bit worried that I might get lost and not find my way back to the bus on time. So in the end, I stayed with the group but off to the side listening to my guide. I realized that although we weren’t going to cover much physical ground, the tour was going to cover the major highlights of the site so I figured I should just relax and accept that I wasn’t going to see everything in such a short amount of time. There’s always next time, right?

After the tour ended, we had about 45 minutes to grab something to eat and\or buy souvenirs. I had a fairly tasty Panini for lunch and a delicious glass of fresh orange juice at one of the many restaurant stalls lining up just outside the Pompeii entrance. It was really interesting that apart from one restaurant/cafe in the middle of the site, there was no main visitor’s center with a gift shop and restaurant/cafe as one might expect in a major tourist attraction. In some ways, it’s almost a better system because all of the vendors right outside the entrance are competing for your business, so that competition probably helps ensure better service. Also, it’s giving more jobs to local people versus just a handful of employees that would run a visitor’s center cafe and gift shop.

Walking up to the top of Mount Vesuvius

From Pompeii, we hopped back on our bus and made our way up to the top of Mount Vesuvius National Park. It was a beautiful drive up as you take in the Bay of Naples and climb higher and higher. Up at the top, we hopped out of our mini bus and were instructed to head towards a hut at the foot of the path that leads up to the crater. Mount Vesuvius is still an active volcano, but what you can see is its ancient (and now inactive) crater, Monte Somma. The hike up took around a half hour and apart from the great views of the Bay of Naples, wasn’t particularly pleasant. It was extremely windy, and dusty, dusty, dusty. I ended up having to give my shoes a bath the next day as the were completely covered in fine volcanic dust. At the top, there’s a path that winds around the crater and it is pretty awesome to behold and imagine what it must have been like when this thing blew its top. I made it all the way around to the final little hut (there were huts scattered along the way up, each selling souvenirs and refreshments) before turning around and heading back down.

Those tiny little specks are people, to give some perspective on the enormity of this crater.

The weird thing about Mount Vesuvius National Park? There must have been hundreds of people there that day, while I was there, and I would imagine thousands over the course of a day. I asked several times, because it seemed to so hard to believe, but there was only one toilet, in a shop at the entrance of the path up to the crater. You were expected to buy something and be a customer before using their loo (though many people were shaking their head in disbelief and didn’t), and it was apparently the only one in the entire National Park. And let me tell you, if you were thinking about communing with nature and going at the top of the crater (because there was nothing once you started hiking up), there wasn’t anything to hide behind. I’m guessing if you had had an emergency while you were climbing up some of the little huts might have had a loo for their worker, but it definitely wasn’t advertised as a public facility. After waiting for 20 minutes for the one down in the shop, I finally got to go but ended up running for my bus and was five minutes late. I don’t know what the Italian authorities are thinking, providing one toilet for hundreds of people, but you would think someone would have the common sense to do something about it. (Or at least those poor shop owners would. They looked pretty disgruntled at the line for the loo snaking out of their store….)

Back on the bus, we made our way back to Naples and caught the ferry over and were then dropped off at our respective hotels. All in all, I was pleased I had gone but next time I think the Mr. and I will make our way to Pompeii on our own so we can take as much time as we’d like.

The city walls of Pompeii

Ischia, Italy’s “Emerald Island” May 29, 2012

On the ferry to Ischia, with Mount Vesuvius in the background.

Soooo, where was I….ah, yes, telling you all about our rail journey across Italy in March\April 2012.

Well, after our four night stay in Venice, the Mr. and I hopped a train down to Naples and from there we planned to take a ferry to the island of Ischia. The train ride down was smooth and uneventful, though we did have the “pleasure” of sharing one of those cramped cabins that the Europeans seem to love where everybody is sitting and facing each other.

If you’ve ever done any amount of rail travel in Europe, you know exactly what I’m talking about. I mean, if you’re travelling as a family or a large group, great; it’s a cozy space where you can all hang out and chat and it’s very intimate. But if you’re only two people, and in a cabin with a whole bunch of other people who don’t know each other, it’s…awkward. That’s the best way to put it. We shared our cabin with a young woman and a young boy (her brother, maybe? definitely not his mother) and an elderly couple who both snored when they fell asleep. At one point the Mr. got out a bag of M&Ms, and I shot him a sort of horrified look as he contentedly munched away, presumably unaware of his rudeness by not offering some to the other passengers. The other passengers who were sitting DIRECTLY ACROSS FROM US, staring at us, less than five feet away. I knew we didn’t have enough to offer to everyone, so I just tried to shrink down in my seat and disappear. Not the first and certainly won’t be the last time we’re the awkward, rude tourists, no doubt

Once in Naples, we hopped into a taxi and were ridiculously ripped off for what ended up being only an 8-minute long journey to the ferry terminal. Once on the ferry, I ended up chatting to a nice Italian woman whose friend at the terminal on Ischia gave us a lift to our accommodation. That was a brilliant stroke of luck to meet such nice people who saved us both time and money getting to the town we were staying in.

The view from Villa Ravino

We arrived at our accommodation, and were immediately pleased with our choice. But more on that later. After dropping off our things in our room, we had to find food. Luckily for us, a small restaurant\carry-out place across the street from us was open. For around 15 euros, we had the best pizza I had ever eaten, along with the most delicious roast chicken and two cold beers. It was food heaven, and even though we were in self-catering accommodation, we ended up going back to that place many, many times.

We spent the next couple of days checking out Forio and our accommodation, buying some groceries and settling in. Although our accommodation was technically in Forio, we were actually uphill from town, and it was a bit of a hike down and back up again. Towards the end of our stay on the island we took the bus more often, but it was usually so crowded that it was better to walk.

Our accommodation was really special. We stayed at the Villa Ravino, which has its own entry on the Wikipedia page for Ischia:

In Giardini Ravino, the botantical gardens attached to Villa Ravino.

Gardens of Villa Ravino

A botanical garden, located in Forio-Citara Bay, resulting of 50 years of great passion and loving work of Captain Giuseppe D’Ambra, the owner of the Villa. Giardini Ravino is a botanical garden with one of the richest collection of cacti and succulents cultivated outdoors in Europe. Giardini Ravino has been awarded from the OPE (European Parliamentary Observatory) as the most ecofriendly property in South Italy. Giardini Ravino is also the location of Meristema Fair, an exhibition dedicated to both professional and quality amateur gardeners, enriched with seminars and hands on experiences handling and discussing for various reasons about biodiversity in nature. Giardini Ravino is also the headquarter of many social associations that organize events, in collaboration with international humanitarian aid organizations, such as MSF (Doctors Without Borders), the non-profit eco-gastronomic member-supported organization Slow Food and many other cultural exhibitions during the year around. Bus-stop “Via Bocca” on the CS, #1 or #2 bus routes.

The Villa’s outdoor pool, and the thermal pool is inside the solarium.

The Villa is located just above the gardens, and we could visit them anytime they were open for free. It was really lovely to wander down and have a drink in the bar, or just take in the beauty of the gardens.

The Aragonese Castle

Our first trip out of town on the island was to Ischia’s main commune, or town, also called Ischia. We took a bus ride over to the town, and then exlored on foot, heading towards the town’s biggest landmark and attraction, the Aragonese Castle. We were really impressed with the town of Ischia, as it had a couple of advantages over Forio as a place to stay. For one, the town is located directly on the beach, and while it doesn’t exactly have a long stretching promenade like we enjoyed in Sitges, Spain, there are stretches that you can walk along with a few restaurants dotted along as well. It’s also bigger than Forio, so there’s more shopping and more places to eat in general. As lovely as the Villa Ravino was, I think in future I’d almost prefer to stay in a town with closer access to a beach. Or possibly stay at the Villa, but with a vehicle to get around more easily.

The view of the town of Ischia, from the Aragonese Castle

The weather started to take a turn for the worse as we headed towards the castle, but we decided to take our chances and check it out anyways. It made for some pretty atmospheric photos, with the dark clouds looming in the sky. The castle offered amazing views of the island, and was well worth the entrance fee, though we were a little disappointed the cafe was already closed for the day.

Walking up the road towards Mount Epomeo

A couple days later, the Mr. and I decided to get another high up view of the island, though this time from the side of Mount Epomeo, the highest mountain on the island of Ischia. We didn’t go all the way to the top (the Mr. would do that on his own, a few days later) but we did walk up along roads from the Villa Ravino to a fairly high vantage point where we enjoyed a fantastic sunset. The higher we climbed, the more remote the road become with only a few houses at the point where we stopped. The Mr. would tell me a few days later that once you get up even higher, towards to the summit, there are no real roads anymore and people who live up there still rely on mules for transportation and moving goods.

Sunset from the side of Mount Epomeo

Sant’Angelo

We visited one other major town on the island during our stay, Sant’Angelo. Sant’Angelo would make headlines a few days after the Mr. and I were there as Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel stayed there on vacation for the Easter holidays. Sant’Angelo is lovely, but the Mr. and I both felt like it was still a bit sleepy at the end of March with many places still being closed for the winter season. In fact, we felt that a bit all over the island, but given that Sant’Angelo is one of the major tourist destinations on the island I think it was even more empty and quiet than other cities where there are more locals living and going about their daily business. We saw many restaurants and some shops all over the island who were just throwing the doors and windows open after the long winter closure, cleaning and painting and sprucing everything up for the onslaught of tourists that would begin to arrive during the Easter holidays and would stay throughout the summer.

Our delicious seafood meal, and you can’t see it, but we had a spectular view.

We enjoyed one of the best meals during the entire trip in Sant’ Angelo. We hadn’t intended to splash out on a pricier meal, but there were so few food options that we really had little choice but to eat at this pricier seafood restaurant for lunch. Luckily, it was worth the pricetag. We shared a delicious seafood pasta dish and a tempura-style dish with all different types of seafood.  Our bellies full, we headed down to the beach to check out Sant’Angelo’s famous fumarole. A fumarole is an opening in a planet’s crust, often in the neighborhood of volcanoes, which emits steam and gases such as carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, hydrogen chloride, and hydrogen sulfide. At this fumarole in Sant’Angelo, the sand is toasty hot and you can bury yourself to stay warm and relaxed. Particularly nice if it’s a slightly chillier day in March!

In the next installment of Holly and the Mr.’s Adventures in Italy 2012, I’ll tell you all about my day-trip adventure to Pompeii and Vesuvius.

Sant’Angelo beach, where you can bury yourself in hot sand next to the fumarole.

The Blog Gods Must Be Crazy April 28, 2012

Mia: See how she's using this adorable image of me to distract you from the fact she hasn't written in ages?

So it’s been a while again. I know I said it wouldn’t be, but I also sort of knew that was a lie when I typed it because we had loads of travel on the then not-too-distant horizon. And when I say ‘travel,’ you should envision steam engines and trunks and being incommunicado for pretty much the entire duration of said travels because neither the Mr. nor I are tech-equipped to be able to do something as fancy as update a blog while we’re away from home. There’s a much better chance you’ll receive a telegram from me rather than read a new blog entry.

Anyway, I returned from the above-mentioned travels (which I will go into more detail about) only a couple of days ago. A few friends who are subscribed to this blog have mentioned to me that it’s been pretty quiet around these parts (insert sound of the wind blowing and tumbleweeds, er, tumbling), so I promised them I would get back to writing ASAP. Then the weather here in Germany took a dramatic turn for the better (i.e. we went from chilly spring weather to SUMMER practically overnight), and the Mr. decided it was time we buy bicycles. Living next to a river here in Würzburg means we have miles and miles of relatively flat, easy cycling which we have so far not taken advantage of except by foot. Suddenly the Mr. became obsessed with the idea of buying bikes and spending this whole weekend cycling, so the plan was to go into town this morning and buy them. The possibility of catching up on my blog became more and more remote….then, BAM! On my way walking to the grocery store yesterday evening, I somehow managed to fall off the sidewalk (I gots the skillz, what can I say?) and onto the pavement. In the process, I nicked up my right knee pretty badly and twisted my ankle. We went to a clinic and had it checked out, and luckily, it’s only a minor sprain. But here I am; it’s been a gorgeous day, 30 degrees celsius (86 degrees fahrenheit), and I’m sitting on the bed with my ankle propped up. Somehow, I can’t help but wonder if the Blog Gods were getting annoyed at my lack of writing and felt they had to intervene.

So allow me to take this opportunity to begin to tell you about our glorious travels. First stop: Bella Venezia!

Discovered this painted onto the corner of a building in Venice.

Back in late March, the Mr. and I boarded a train bound for Venice. With only one stop in between Würzburg and Venice, we left at around 9am and got in to Venice at around 6pm. Not bad for a day’s journey! We decided to use our legs and walked from the train station to our hotel near the Rialto Bridge.

Venice is beautiful. It really, truly, is enchantingly romantic and interesting. I figured I would like it as so many people say how great it is, but I don’t think I was prepared for how much I would love it. And to be fair, we were probably seeing the city at its best as I understand it gets insanely crowded in the summertime and sometimes even stinky from the canal. We were exploring with ideal conditions of pleasant weather with no stink and no crowds. But it seemed like every corner we turned there was yet another fantastic view with breathtaking architecture, cute shops and tempting gelato.

Bella Venezia

The most challenging part of visiting Venice is finding good, cheap food. Because we were going to be on the road for quite a while (Venice was the first stop), the Mr. and I tried to eat on a budget as much as possible. It meant we ate a lot of slices of pizza on the street and gelato, and only ate in a restaurant a couple of times (and the first time we got totally ripped off…I asked for the house white wine, and they brought me a half bottle that cost 16 Euros!) I’d heard people complain about the food in Venice before, so I sort of knew it wouldn’t be great value or all that good compared to what you get in other parts of the country. But just walking the streets and taking in the view pretty much makes up for that….

We spent a total of four nights and three full days in Venice, and it’s now at the top of my list of cities I’d like to visit again or even stay in on a longer-term basis. I think having a few days to walk around and really take it all in also helped me fall in love with the city. If we had had only a frantic, single day in the main tourist areas I don’t think I would have been nearly so taken with the place. We didn’t even go inside a single museum or art gallery (of which there were several that sounded very interesting), which I suppose is also a testament to just how lovely a city it is to explore and simply take in.

Our time in Venice flew quickly by, and all too soon it was time to board the train and head south to Naples where we would take the ferry to an island called…

Ischia!

Off the coast of the island of Ischia, Italy

Stay tuned for the next installment of “Holly and the Mr.’s Adventures in Italy 2012.”

Home Again, Home Again April 12, 2010

I’ve been living abroad for 5 ½, going on six years now, and it’s interesting how my idea of “home” has changed over the years. Initially, when I first moved to Scotland, home was the US and Indiana. And then slowly over the years, as my possessions overseas grew along with my relationships, home somehow also became Edinburgh. Now that the Mr.  and I have moved to Germany, the idea of home has become even more complicated. Can someone have three “homes”?

Indiana will always be one of my homes as long as I have family there. And in some ways, I still feel like Edinburgh is home, too. I suppose that feeling will probably fade the longer we are gone, but it was the city where I spent the majority of my adult life working and living until this point. And now Würzburg is home. Sort of. Some might argue it’s our only home as it’s where the Mr.”s job is, and although 95% of our stuff is in storage somewhere 50 km away at the moment, it’s where the majority of our possessions are kept. But what defines a home? Is it where your job and things are located? Or is it where your friends and family are? For now, I’m finding it a little difficult to think of Würzburg as home since we’re living a bit like nomads and we have no friends or family here. And yet, when we returned from Italy on Tuesday, it did feel in a way like we were coming home.

Living abroad or traveling, it’s not uncommon to be asked, “Where are you from?” as soon as it’s clear you’re not local. The response used to be that I’m from the US, the Mr. is from Germany and we live in Scotland. Now that we’re living in Germany and the Mr. is German we’ll probably get asked that question less, but somehow I feel torn when explaining where I’m from. Although I was born and raised in the US, I somehow also want to acknowledge that I’ve lived in Scotland for the last 5 ½ years and not the US. True, 5 1/2 years is not that long to live away from the US, and yet my outlook on life and the way I see the world has undoubtedly also been shaped by my experiences living in the UK. And yet to explain all this to someone who probably just wants a simple answer is not really possible.

Italy was beautiful. Although I was a bit worried about driving on the Autobahn to get there, once we got past Munich and into Austria it was less crazy. Thankfully Austria is a very sensible country with speed restrictions in place. Limone was absolutely gorgeous nestled in the mountains on Lake Garda and I couldn’t believe that it was actually as pretty as the images on the internet. Our hotel was very nice and very affordable considering the amazing views you get of the lake. Someday I’ll add photos I took of our room and the grounds. I have a feeling it’s probably pretty packed with guests in the summer, but we practically had it to ourselves which made it really peaceful and relaxing. The Mr. went swimming in the indoor pool every day and he had it to himself each time.  I wish I could say we had sunshine and blue skies every day we were there, but we only had two days of really good weather and one day that was absolutely dismal. We spent our time exploring a few of the towns around Lake Garda and also drove to Verona. We checked out “Juliet’s balcony,” or at least the balcony of a home that supposedly belonged to the Capulet family.

Casa di Giulietta Verona

It was tourist trap in many respects, but still fun to visit and the Mr. snapped a photo of me on the balcony (not me in the photo, however…I’m striking a dreamy Juliet pose, I believe!)  Our stay in Italy finished, we drove back to Germany to the country inn near Ulm where the Mr.’s family gathers each year for Easter. I enjoyed seeing his family, but somehow I always find it a little exhausting. The family meets over the course of three days, which is nice but is longer than any extended family gathering I’ve ever attended. Because they spend so much time together over these three days, I find myself getting frustrated and feeling a little isolated by the end as most of the conversation is obviously in German. It has gotten better as I can now understand key words here and there so I can often get a basic idea of what’s being discussed, but three days is still a long time to not really be part of the conversations happening. I hope that by next year I will have taken an intensive language class and the weekend will be more enjoyable.

And now we’re back in Würzburg. Well, Höchberg to be specific. Mia meowed quite a bit the evening we picked her up from the cat hotel and a little the next morning, but she seems to be back to normal. The search for a flat or house continues. While we were away, we missed out on a couple of things that potentially could have been good, but now we simply have to be very focused and not miss any other opportunities. Who knows…maybe “home” will feel more like home once we have a structural one of our own.

Arrivederci, Germany! March 26, 2010

Well, for five nights, anyway =)

Back before we moved to Germany, we had planned to do a short vacation in Italy in April. We figured would have been living in our new flat for more than a month at that point, so in theory the kitchen would have been delivered and installed, boxes would have been unpacked, etc. When we lost the flat,* however, the idea of going away pretty much went out the window as our new priority on arrival would be to find a flat or house ASAP. The likelihood of being able to go to Italy suddenly looked slim.

Well, almost a month down the road we still don’t have a place to call home. We’re going to see a place tomorrow that is located on a street with a very interesting name. It has lots of positive things going for it, but it’s on the more affordable side and we haven’t seen any pictures yet so I’m not holding my breath. I’ll blog about it either way – whether we take it or not – as it’s really too good an opportunity to pass up telling you all about it.  In some ways, it still seems like a bad idea to pack up and go anywhere as our first priority really should be checking every day for new property listings and immediately trying to set up a viewing for anything promising. On the other hand, we’re being kicked out of our holiday let this weekend as the owners need to honor a previous booking so perhaps that’s the excuse we needed….

Here’s the plan: the cat goes into the “cat hotel” tomorrow and will be there for about a week-and-a-half. She was there two weeks ago for three days, and although she came back a little smelly she didn’t seem to be irreparably damaged by the experience. She did get an upset tummy that apparently resulted in a bit of mess on her backside (and they gave her a bath), but it was likely caused by flea medicine she was licking off. That being said, this move has been tough on her and I feel guilty for inflicting further trauma. She’s scared of strangers now, for example. She used to be confident and friendly towards anyone who visited our flat, and now she hides when the owners from upstairs come in. So I know that us hauling her away in her carrier and then leaving her there will be hard.  On all of us. And this time it will be for much, much longer, which of course we can’t explain to her. They don’t understand people language, and it sucks.

Still, we’re looking forward to a “mini vacation” on Lake Garda. I’ve only been to Rome, and have longed for quite some time to see more of Italy. We’re staying in a small town called Limone, in what looks to be a fairly nice hotel with great views.

Limone on Lake Garda

After spending five days in Italy, we’ll drive back to Germany to the little town near Ulm where the Mr.”s family gathers each year for Easter. After Easter weekend, it’s back to Würzburg and most likely, back to the search for a place to call home.

*See my first post, “Hell Might Be Freezing Over,” for details on this delightful experience.