Napoli

Originally posted on my Tumblr travel blog, A Roman Spring with IES, in 2008.

This past weekend I traveled with my friend Sarah to Naples. Its about a 2 ½ hour trip on the slow/cheap train. We left around 8am and got in around 1030am. It wasn’t too eventful, except that I lost in a game of war…

After getting into the train station we had to figure out the best way to our hostel. Unfortunately, neither Sarah nor I were smart enough to write down the name of the hostel. All we had was the address, which I had written down. We ended up taking the metro, and got off on a stop that I thought was the correct one. Once out of the metro station, we realized how hard it was going to be to find a road we didn’t know how to look for. We ended up stopping to ask two boys (probably high school age) where the road was. It ended up being a hilarious conversation, because one of the boys knew how to get there, but didn’t know how to speak English. The other boy knew better English, so ended up acting as a translator. Sarah also knows a bit of Italian, so the final result of the encounter ended up being quite hysterical.

After getting directions, we finally found our hostel. “La Controra” was placed far back in an alley and looked like kind of a sketchy area. However, beyond the gate, we realized that it was a very nice hostel. We put all of our stuff away and headed out to the Museo Archeologico Nazionale (the National Archaeological Museum). Basically, this museum’s main purpose is to house all the paintings, mosaics, sculptures, pottery, glass, everyday-life tools that were found in Pompeii during excavations.

Before we got to museum, we had to eat. And what is Naples known for? Why, its pizza, of course. So guess what we had…..pizza! We found a small pizzeria along the way and stopped to order a pizza. We found that the pizzerias in Naples are much different than the ones in Rome or Florence. Instead of the pizzeria baking one big slab of pizza and cutting you off a piece, Naples will make you a fresh round pizza just for you. We ordered a Margarita (no it’s not alcoholic, it’s cheese and tomato sauce), and in 3 minutes they they had made it, cooked it, and boxed it. The best part was that it only cost 3.50 euro for the whole thing. However, even better than the price or the time it took to cook, was the taste of the pizza. It is by far the best pizza I have ever eaten and I am sad to say that I don’t think I can ever have pizza in the States ever again. Unfortunately, it is an indescribable taste and one must go there and eat it to truly know what I am talking about.

The museum ended up being very cool and it was just fascinating to look at all the objects that were uncovered. These items are some 2000 years old and yet they look in perfect condition. It is amazing what a natural disaster can do to preserve items.

After the museum, we had to get more pizza (once just wasn’t enough!). So we found another pizzeria and got the pizza in 5 minutes (not 3 minutes). It was still better than any pizza in the States, but it wasn’t as good as the first we had had in Naples. From there we walked down to the bay area and watched the sunset by the “Egg” Castle that is located on a pier. We tried to get into the castle, but it was closed by the time we got there.

We had a long hike back up to our hostel and took a nap upon arrival. After waking up from the nap, we met our roommates. They were two girls from Australia doing the whole backpacking of Europe thing. We ended up tagging along with them for the night, and met up with Valerio, a guy who works at La Controra whom the girls had met earlier that day. He was a really nice guy and took us on a short walking tour of the city, where he pointed out really great historical buildings or monuments that we wouldn’t have known about without his help.

After, we went to a discoteca called the “Kinky Klub”. Don’t ask me why it’s called that, I don’t know. But it was a really fun club because they had a reggae/hip-hop DJ mixing his own beats on stage. Valerio, being the great guy he is, got us in for free and we danced until early in the morning until walking back the hostel.

The next day, all four of us hopped on a train to attempt to get to the top of Mount Vesuvius. We ended up finding a Vesuvius Express that would take us up to within 1000m of the summit. Unfortunately, it was a very rainy day and when we got closer to the summit, it was snowing. They ended up closing the park due to bad weather, something we didn’t know until reaching the park entrance. So when we got back down to the station, we were only refunded for our entrance tickets and had to pay for the transportation up, even though we didn’t get to see anything! Everyone, particularly Sarah, was quite mad about this.

From there, Sarah and I went on to Pompei. Upon buying tickets, we were told that women got in for free because it was International Women’s Day. This made Sarah a bit happier, and so we entered Pompei with enthusiasm. I wish the weather had been a bit better because it was practically downpouring, but we made the best of our time.

Pompei ended up being extremely interesting. Although pretty much all that remains is the walls of the buildings, it is by far the most extensive example of the layout of a Roman city today. When walking down the streets, its hard not to think about what life would have been like 2000 years ago, before the volcano errupted.

I think my favorite part was just seeing the layout of the city and where public life and private life would have taken place. The city also has some great examples of Roman houses that are very well preserved. We also saw the inside of one of the cities brothels……a very interesting sight. Another funny thing was that for about an hour, a stray dog followed Sarah around the city. He/she was very well behaved and Sarah took a liking to him/her and named him/her “pomplemousse”.

We returned on the train, only to find that when we got back to Naples they were checking tickets. We were dumb and didn’t buy the tickets that we needed to get back (to be honest, it’s not very well marked on how to do so) but we got out of a fine because we didn’t speak any Italian and they didn’t speak any English. We got lucky; I wouldn’t recommend trying it again.

That night Sarah and I went to a Pizzeria that Valerio recommended to us. It is called Pizzeria Starita a Materdei. Actually, he worked there for awhile, but he said it was the best in Naples(he might have been a bit biased). But actually, I don’t think he was that far off. We had to wait awhile to sit, but when we did, we told the waiter that Valerio sent us and he said that he would “take care of us”. We ended up getting three different pizza, all had very distinct cooking styles or ingredients. All three of these were the best pizzas I have ever tasted and I wouldn’t be surprised if they were considered the best in the world.

We went to bed early in hopes of getting up to climb Mount Vesuvius in the morning. However, upon reaching the train station, we were forced to give up on the idea due to the time it would take and the two papers. So, we grabbed lunch and walked around the city a bit before jumping on a train and heading home.

All in all, the trip was amazing. Although the city of Naples wasn’t that interesting (or clean, they have been having sporadic garbage strikes that leave large piles out in the streets), the people we met or interacted with totally made the experience. Also, the five pizzas that we had in two days didn’t hurt the experience ;-)

I will be sure to put up pictures very soon.

Ciao.