Weekend Trip

     This weekend we left Friday for Pompei, then headed on to Sorrento that night and Went to Capri the next morning and back to Rome Saturday night.

Pompei's mosaic floors.

A vendor's booth in Pompei

Streets of Pompei

Walls that we learned about in class!

Pompeian Forum and Mt. Vesuvius.

     Pompei was fun, but since I'd already seen it, it was a little boring. Looking at ruins usually gets boring after the first hour and a half anyway. It was interesting to combine several of the things I now know about art and archaeology from that time period (79AD I believe) with what I was seeing. But still, seeing the same rooms that I remembered from the last time I was there was not exactly exciting. It was nice to get some more pictures, and the group picture in front of Mt Vesuvius and the Pompeian Forum is also cool. But anyways, I would only recommend going on the same introductory level tour once. If you want to truly hunt around and look at things in depth it could be a lot more fun.

A cute little lock!

Beautiful Sorrento.

Lemon Orchard

Lemon Orchard.

And again.

Castle type building in Sorrento.

     We left Pompei and went to Sorrento. Sorrento is my favorite town in Campania (a region of Italy). It's just beautiful, kinda has a smaller town feel, and is way cheaper than Capri. We arrived at the hotel, considered swimming then decided to go venture out into the town instead. We saw lots of cute shops and some beautiful coastline views. In Sorrento, you can find lots of street vendors selling beautiful porcelains, and charms with chili peppers on them. The porcelains are made nearby and are one of their trademarks like their lemons and Limoncello. The chili peppers are to ward off the evil eye. We got gelato at a small gelateria, and they offered us a free sample of Limoncello... It was really strong, and tasted mostly like Vodka, I was immediately uninterested. We found a club to visit later, and a lemon orchard. The orchard was so pretty I took a ton of pictures. Then we headed back for dinner where I had gnocchi and some sort of pork. They were both absolutely delicious. So was the strawberry cake I chose for dessert. Then we went back to the hotel rooms and got ready to go out dancing. I hadn't really planned on dancing, but everyone had made it sound like so much fun and I hadn't brought anything better to do with my night, so, out I went. We walked to a bar that said it had karaoke (it didn't). And we all started dancing, some of us better than others. I'll admit freely, I'm definitely not one of the best dancers, but I definitely had fun. Everyone was shocked, 1. that I had even come out with them and 2. that I was dancing and having fun. Apparently I'd gained a bit of a reputation as a homebody since I hadn't gone out with the group yet. Anyways we kept dancing, switched bars once and then decided it was time for gelato and the trek back to the hotel. Thankfully I and a few of the other girls are really good with directions and we never strayed far of the main streets.

Bluest waters you've ever seen!

So beautiful.

You're supposed to say a wish as you go under.
However I couldn't think of anything to wish for.

Almost everyone went swimming.

Just a fun picture of splashy water.

     In the morning we took a ferry to Capri, which is without a doubt one of the most gorgeous places I've ever been. We took a boat ride immediately upon arriving and that is really the best way to get an idea of what the island has to offer. I highly recommend it, even the second time around it's amazing! There's also a ton of really fancy (and expensive) shops in the upper city of Capri. The whole city looks kind of like a Grecian city, almost all the houses are white, and contrast beautifully with the blue waters and green vegetation. The rocks are also a stark white. Really it's just amazing there. We left Capri at 4pm and took a ferry back to Naples.

A castle-y thing in Naples.

Port of Naples. Right before my camera died.

     Naples isn't one of my favorite Italian cities. To me, it's a little dirtier, a little more left behind (60s projects are everywhere), and the mafia is supposedly more prevalent there (almost as bad as Sicily) than anywhere else. I really don't know anything good it's famous for besides Pizza.

      We drove straight from Naples to Rome. I was really happy when we finally got back, It seemed like it took forever! Sunday I was so tired I decided to stay in bed most of the day and got up pretty much just for lunch and gelato. Kinda sad, but super relaxing and just what I needed.