Naples (Not Sorrento), Italy

April 9, 2023

Easter Sunday found us in Naples, Italy, not Sorrento as scheduled. My impression is that, because it was Easter Sunday, Sorrento would not be able to handle our docking needs. While this was certainly an unwelcome change for those who booked independent shore excursions out of Sorrento, it didn’t change our plans at all. We were going to Pompeii on a Princess excursion!

I never get tired of driving through the countryside of the countries we’ve visited.

As our bus of about 40 people drove neared our destination, we were told we’d be picking up an additional guide in Pompeii. There is a size limit to tour groups exploring Pompeii, so we’d be divided in half. Our half of the bus was assigned to the new guide, Guido. We were very blessed to have had him as our guide. Guido was as older man who had been guiding for years. He loved his job and it showed in his humorous commentary. Our bus now divided, each group headed into Pompeii in opposite directions.

This was my first view of a place I’ve wanted to visit since I can remember.

The city of Pompeii was destroyed in 79 AD when Mt. Vesuvius erupted. In about two and a half minutes the entire city and all of its population of about 25,000 was destroyed. Most of the population was vaporized, but some of the people were encased in lava. When they were found, there was nothing left except the outlines of the people. Archeologists were able to use plaster to make very accurate casts of these unfortunate people and they can be seen in Pompeii today. I was uncomfortable taking pictures of them, but photographs can be easily found on the internet.

The first part of our tour took us to the archeological museum where there were displays of statues, frescos and the casts of victims of the eruption, including a dog and a pregnant woman.

There was even some ancient graffiti of a gladiator fighting a wild animal.

Exiting the museum, we were finally entering the city proper. This was a big, bustling city and we saw ruins of temples, forums, and houses. We also saw lots of other tourists. It was a holiday after all.

We went into the ruins of a home of an upper class family. Every room had different mosaic floors.

There was so much of Pompeii that we didn’t have time to see. This is not a small site. It was so easy to imagine what the city must have looked like with the residents going about their daily lives.

After we returned to our ship, we decided to take the afternoon to rest. My cough was still bothering me and we had four more port days in a row. Tomorrow, I was finally going to go to Rome and I wanted to be rested up. Consequently, we never made it into Naples, but we were content with our decision. We’ve learned that you can’t do everything!