Pompei Scavi

Sunday 11 October

Pompei

Absolutely fantastic! We have had the most brilliant day. Pompei is magnificent. We spent hours and hours and hours wandering the excavations and imagining life in 79AD. The site is huge – 66 hectares, of which 50 have been excavated, and a boundary of 3.2 kilometres (which we covered at least 20 times!) I guess I knew it was a town, but to see it – streets, houses, shops, temples, public buildings – I was astounded. It is hard to imagine that a whole city and all its inhabitants were obliterated in a matter of hours when Vesuvio erupted. We saw everything that was open –some houses were closed for perhaps, renovations(?) It was fascinating and just a bit sad and poignant, particularly when we saw the casts of the bodies. One was a pregnant woman who was shielding her tummy and covering her face. The excavations have been going on since 1748 and there is still a large area to be worked on, although it has been known about since 16th century. we explored gardens, 1st century fast food, theatres, and temples, even teh brothel -I had never been in one before, so that was exciting!
Pompei was one of my “must sees” in Italy and I am so glad we have made the trip.

One surprising aspect of the day was trying to find the site. There is very little information around and very few signs indicating the location of Pompei Scavi. We asked three or four people who were very helpful but a bit vague about the site’s location. It’s right in the town, and we only detected two signs, one while we still on the bus, about 3 kms away. We took the local bus from Salerno to Pompei and what good value that was! $1:60 for a scenic drive along the coast, through the towns and under the shadow of Vesuvio. The train home was much quicker, and much less scenic.

The day was topped off when we were waiting on the station for the train back to Salerno and two women started chatting with us. We spent a good 40 minutes conversing in Italian and brushed up on some of our lessons. One of them has a boutique and invited us to come tomorrow so I can say, “Voglio comprare un portafolio” (I want to buy a small handbag”). I’ll try to take up the offer!