Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 11:17:06 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Buona sera

Day 2 - (Dec 29)

Starting at 7:30 AM, there was a tour to Naples, Pompeii, and Sorrento. Back to
hotel sometime after 11pm. So again another long day!

Along the way was a view of the Abbey of Montecassino... Drove through Napoli
fairly quickly without stopping anywhere.... then went to Pompeii and had
lunch, followed by a guided tour of the ruins.

Pompeii was buried for more than 1700 years.... and ever since 17(something)
A.D., the excavations have been going on to this day -- more than 250-some
years! So far, they've uncovered 3/5th of the city, and according to our
tourguide, to really see it all requires 2 full days. We spent just over 2
hours there!

It was fantastic to see though - everything was very well preserved... could
even see the grooves that were left in the roads from the Roman chariots! Saw a
couple of dead bodies from 79 A.D. and I never imagined I'd be so fascinated to
see a dead person! Also went to the largest house discovered so far in the
city. It had a mosaic picture in the doorway, with a picture of a dog and the
letters "Cave Cavinum" (or something like that - dont remember exactly now)...
anyway, apparantly this the very first occurence in human history of a "Beware
of Dog" sign (discovered so far, and completely intact to this day). There were
a lot of other little things about Pompeii that were very interesting..... like
the 1-way and 2-way streets for traffic! Their plumbing system (or the lack of
one and how they got around it).... just too much!

After Pompeii the bus drove down to the resort town of Sorrento, which is at
the end of a peninsula across from Napoli, and also about 6 miles from the
island of Capri. Gorgeous drive all the way down, very similar to Hwy 1 in
california (or 101 in oregon). In Sorrento was a visit to "the famous inlaid
woodworks factory" -- according to the tourguide it's the only one in the
World, but that's a little hard to believe. But they import all kinds of wood
from all over the world, make their furniture or music boxes or chess
boards/pieces or grandfather clocks etc... then export those all over the
world!

By the time the bus got back to Roma I was exhausted... so skipped dinner that
night.

Naples: All of these were taken from the bus; we didn't really stop anywhere...

Pompeii: In all of the columns that you see, the marble portion is original; the bricks portion is the reconstruction

Other Pictures: Abbey of Montecassino, Mt. Vesuvius as seen from Naples, and the town of Sorrento

Table of Contents
December 30 : Vatican Museums and Ancient Rome tours