Author: marionvermazen

Today we continued down the Italian coast to the ‘toe’ of Italy where we caught a ferry across to Sicily. A separate ferry was loading big trucks as our ferry was loading cars. It was impressive to see the giant semis making a 90 degree turn onto their ferry.

The whole operation was very efficient. They were loading and unloading our ferry at the same time. It was all very fast.

It is a beautiful day so the views as we cruised the Mediterranean were great. It actually was a very short ride

We are staying up in the mountains above the north coast of Sicily. The place is called Villa Ginevra.

For dinner the hotel made us a reservation at a restaurant even farther up in the mountains. It was a good thing we had a reservation because there were two big parties going on there too.

The place we stayed last night, Iumara Relax Resort, was fantastic. It’s quite new. The property manager, Paolo, was very friendly and helpful.

Paolo offered to set up a tour of the owner’s water buffalo farm for us. We jumped at the chance and got to do the tour this morning. The water buffalo are raised to be milked. The milk is used to make mozzarella cheese.

One interesting thing that we learned is that they use the waste from the cows to make all their own electricity! We all thoroughly enjoyed the tour.

After our tour we drove south further along the Calabrian coast. We stopped often to stretch and enjoy the views. Once we even stopped to eat gelato.

We are staying in a small B and B in San Lucido. We played cards before dinner and then walked around the town and found a coast side restaurant for dinner.

This morning we had a great breakfast at our B and B. Before we left I sat outside for a while and enjoyed the wonderful view of the Amalfi Coast.

When we started our drive today we continues on the incredibly scenic, narrow and winding roads for the first part of the drive.

Eventually we reached Salerno where the Amalfi Coast ends. We continued along the coast and stopped at a grocery store to buy water, wine and snacks.

Farther along the coast we came to the Paestum Archaelogical Park. The Park is an ancient town with the remains of three Greek Temples dating from around 550 to 450 BC. We parked and explored the ruins.

From the ruins we went to the small museum. They had paintings and artifacts from Greek tombs found near Paestum.

Tonight we are staying at a wonderful hotel in Omignano Scalo, IUMARA Relax Resort. We had a great dinner at the hotel and had a fascinating talk with the host of the restaurant. He looked at our itinerary and told Duke, “you are not typical American tourists!”

Duke finally lost a few games in our card playing this afternoon. Jo Ann was the big winner today. The score is now Duke 13, Jo Ann 7, Brian 5, Marion 5.

When I was a kid I was fascinated by the idea of Pompeii, a city buried in time. Today we went to visit the Pompeii archaeological site. Duke and I have been there once before but I think I could go back again and again. It still fascinates me.

One of the things I love about Pompeii is the signs of everyday life you see there, like the stepping stones to cross the road and the ruts in the rocks from the chariot wheels.

We took the train to and from Pompeii

When we got back to Naples after our visit to Pompeii we rested a bit then took a taxi to the Archaeological Museum of Naples. The museum is where much of what was discovered in the excavation of Pompeii is displayed.

Getting to and from the Museum We got to experience Naples taxi drivers arguing when two drivers both thought they should be driving us. We got to experience the crazy drivers, traffic and horns on the two taxi rides. And we got to experience each taxi driver try to rip us off.

After Duke insisted that the second driver use the meter not just name a price and the driver finally agreed, the driver asked Duke if he was French, Duke said “no I’m American”. The driver said “You no American. Americans tranquillo! (Easy going)”. I guess they don’t get many Americans who don’t want to be ripped off. What an adventure!

The museum was wonderful. Many of the statues, mosaics and murals found in Pompeii are there. The mosaics were so detailed and fine.

They also had the Farnese collection of statues taken from the Baths of Caraclla in Rome. Next time we go to Rome I definitely want to visit the baths. They cover 60 acres and were built about 1800 years ago. The main hall was surrounded by these enormous statues. When Rome fell they were covered up and not rediscovered until the 1500’s

For dinner we ate at a great restaurant near our hotel, da Donato.