Europe trip 2019. Fourth stop: Italy - Part 2

ITALY (Continued)

08 September 2019

The campground has a 10 o’clock check out time. 10 AM doesn’t sound that early, but we normally don’t get ready till about 12. So today we are forced to be organised and leave before this time. But we did it, at 10am on the dot we leave this beautiful campground at the beach behind us and drive to mount Vesuvius. Mount Vesuvius, which is actually a volcano, is famous for erupting in 79 AD and covering the entire Roman city Pompeii with volcanic ash. Around 2000 people died, but the city was almost fully preserved. Its giving a unique insight in the Roman life of this time. We will be visiting the city tomorrow,  but today we are hiking up the volcanic mountain.

We are not the only ones that had the idea of hiking up it today. With the parking lot not even in sight we hit a traffic jam. Hiking up mount Vesuvius must be on every tourist website,  in every travel blog,  in each travel magazine or book. It’s a golden opportunity for the Italians to make money. Parking is EUR 6 and the entrance to the hike is 15 per person. There are even taxis to bring you from the parking lot to the starting point of the hike, in exchange for a couple euros of course. This is about 1,5 km up the hill, literally a 2 min ride. The idea of taking a taxi to the start of the track when you are there to hike is so ridiculous to us, that we obviously don’t do this. We are a minority with this opinion though. Only a few others hike to the start, 99% takes the taxi.

The track that leads up mount Vesuvius is about 3,5 km long. Looking up at the track ahead of us it looks like a pilgrimage, its a long chain of people hiking up. The path is not very wide, it’s a challenge to pass people who are slower than you. The path is quite steep, rewarding you with a spectacular view the higher you get. Looking south you are looking over the Amalfi coast and looking north you can see the city textures of Napels.

Eventually at the top you reach the crater, which is collapsed inward. The path goes around it in a half moon, so you can see it from all different angles. The collapsed crater is really deep, without going over the safety railing you cannot see the bottom of it. The wall of the crater is immense and has all different colours and rock layers. If you are into geology this is definitely a place to visit. From certain places we can see steam coming from the ground.

Even though I prefer hikes and places that aren’t as overcrowded as this one, I still really enjoy the hike and the specialty of this place. It’s not every day you stand on top of a volcano.

After the hike we drive to Pompeii and find a spot on the campground in the middle of town. It’s a nice campground with large grass pitches and lots of fruit trees. We make the most of the great location and walk into town after settling in. Unfortunately we just missed the market on the big square, but we walk further towards the city centre. We have a look around the city and are tempted in having some gelato. The chocolate flavour I chose is one of the creamiest I have ever had. Soooo delicious!

The historical Roman settlement Pompeii which is now an open air museum, goes right through the city centre and we catch some glimpses of what it looks like. We will be visiting this museum tomorrow. I have always had a thing with ruins so I am super excited.

09 September 2019

We have a busy day ahead of us, so we try to get organised and start the day early again like yesterday.  The open air museum of Pompeii opens at 09 and we try to be there at this time. Or 9.30, which is a more realistic time for us, let’s be honest. But we don’t make either of these times, as our van is being invaded by ants. Last night we had put the mosquito net on the side of the van, covering our entrance. We had left the mosquito net on in the night and the ants found out they can climb the net and make it onto our car. They are walking everywhere.

When I see this, the penny drops on the white stuff I had seen around other campers. It looked like they had marked their spot, but I now realise it’s some sort of poison to keep the ants away. Very clever. But too late for us. So we spend a good half hour or so battling the ants.

After this unexpected eventful morning we walk over to the open air museum. We have hummed and had for a while on paying for a guide or guided tour, but they are quite expensive. In the end we decided to go with a cheaper alternative that is still going to give us information about the ruins: a paid app you can download on your phone. It suggests a route for you through the historical Roman city (based on how much time you want to spend) and gives information about the most important ruins.

When we start our self-guided walking tour we soon realise an actual guide would have been the way to go, they are giving way more (interesting) information than our pre-recorded text from the app. Luckily for us there were a lot of groups with a guide and we tried to listen in as much as we could. I learned from one of the tour guides I was listening in on that the display of the mummified person sitting with his knees upright tugged towards his body wasn’t actually sitting, but laying in the foetus position. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to ask why they display him as sitting up right. I also learned that it’s a replica, only the mummified people showcased in a glass casket are real. I also learned when the Roman city was excavated there were a lot of statues everywhere . Almost every one of them has been removed or replaced by a replica. One of the replicas that really draws my attention is the big half horse half person one that sits on a big pedestal in the middle of the historical town square. It’s a really powerful image and again I wish I could ask someone what the story with this statue is. Nevertheless,  it keeps catching my eye and I stand there watching it for a bit.

There is so much ground to cover, we underestimated the size of the city. It’s honestly enormous. We have chosen to do a 3 hour walking tour and during this time we will only see a fraction of this place. The app also has suggestions for an 8 hour tour or even a multiple day one. I can see why, there is enough to discover. We still get a good idea of Roman life in this city though. With the town square, market places, Roman court, Roman city council buildings with the most amazing mosaic floors that have been preserved, the amphitheatre for entertainment, a sporting area, living quarters with a ‘ be aware of the dog ‘ mosaic at the entrance. It’s all incredible. With the clay pottery and water cans in mind that are on display you can almost see the Roman’s living their live here back in 79 AD.

After three hours soaking up this interesting place it’s time for us to go. But I am confident we will come back again in the future and plan more time to learn more about this great place.

In the afternoon we drive about 350 km north with destination Lake Bolsena. I can´t exactly remember why we decided to go to this place. I think it was because we needed to make kilometres north again to make it back to the race track in time for when Rhys´s work starts again (in a couple of days). And since Italy has many great lakes it would be a good place to spend the night.

In our camping book we had found what appeared to be a great free camping spot near the lake. When we arrived there it was in fact an amazing location, right by the water side. It was probably so great that it had become too popular and the council had placed signs that parking overnight for campers was forbidden. Bummer! There were no free alternatives in the area so we quickly googled the reviews on campgrounds that we had driven past and choose the best one.

It was a campground right on the lake. It had really big pitches and except for the pitches right on the water side, there was still plenty of room to choose a nice spot.

While Rhys prepares dinner I take my big camera with me and walk to the lake. The sun is setting and its creating a beautiful coloured sky. A really nice ‘golden hour’ to get some good shots.

We have a candle light dinner and it’s been one of those impressive days again where you get reminded how awesome the travelling live is and that the money and effort you have put in to make this happen is 10000x worth it.

10 September 2019

Last night a bus full of (15-17 year old?) students had arrived and checked into bungalows that are part of the campground. Our quiet campground was no longer so quiet anymore. They were obviously loud in the evening and loud again early in the morning. So it’s a reasonably early start for us, but that’s ok because it’s a gorgeous day. We have breakfast and then Rhys starts the day by going for a run and I head over to the campground pool to do my laps. I haven’t really been able to swim laps since Slovenia and it’s great to be able to here. It’s so nice by the pool that Rhys joins me after he has returned from his run and we chill out in the grass for a while.

After lunch we grab our mountain bikes and head to town. There is a market on once (or a couple times) a week and today is market day. However, when we arrive it’s more or less siesta time and they have packed up. Somehow we have done it again: not working with the Italian day planning. We keep missing out on this kind of stuff due to their siesta time and our day planning. But it’s all good, we continue our cycle and end up in the old part of Bolsena. It’s on a hill, with a castle at the top. It’s so steep that we have to get off our bicycles and just walk. To get to the castle we end up in this maze of super narrow, super cute Italian streets. They are picture perfect. There is even a place that has the typical Italian table cloth with red and white checkers, drying on a balcony washing line and there is a vespa scooter parked in the street.

There is a small information centre near the castle that is also serving as a museum. The museum gave entrance to a wine cellar, which was restored to how it was used back in the day. Back then they used the natural caves in the hill as wine cellars, to keep the wine at a constant (cool) temperature. The museum also had a World War II gun turret on display, which was super interesting.

Divers had found it in the Bolsena Lake. It has a woman’s name carved on the side: Lois Ileen. This name made it possible to find out the story behind the turret. The words were still visible after 70 years underwater, and were carved on the right and left side of the turret. The International Group of Historic Aircraft Recovery managed to uncover the words that meant to Lois Eileen, a young woman married to Sergeant Ralph Truesdale, the planes gunner. He was among 9 others on the ill-fated plane, that belonged to the US Army Air Forces. If you want to read the full story of what happened on the last flight, and what happened to the crew members, this article has the full story:
https://www.warhistoryonline.com/war-articles/ileen-lois.html

After our wander through the old town and visit to the museum we continued our cycling tour. We bought some food to snack on at the local supermarket, because as per usual I got quite hungry and we didn’t bring much with us. When we returned back to our campground it was late afternoon and we finished our awesome day with a swim in the lake. Life is good!