When we last left off, we had battled the treacherous waters on the ferry of Positano and we begin today with the absolutely amazing sites of Mount Vesuvius and the remains of Pompeii.
As an anthropology major, Pompeii is kind of the end all be all archaeological site and therefore I was stoked to see it. If you aren't up to date on your ancient cities, Pompeii was a city that got buried in the process of Mount Vesuvius erupting in the year 79 AD. In the 1700s, it was unearthed and excavations are still happening today.
That morning we awoke praying that we would be blessed with good weather. Here we were in Italy with Irish weather and meanwhile Ireland has Italian weather. Just our luck. I blame Kelsey, who is notorious for having terrible luck. After getting ready and eating breakfast (we were really tired of rolls and cornflakes by now) we loaded up on the bus to head to Mount Vesuvius. The drive was pretty short, I want to say it was under an hour. The drive was incredibly scenic and gorgeous. Ireland and Italy are both beautiful, but in completely different ways. If I had to choose, I think I would end up in a straightjacket in a room with padded walls. But, I will say that the drive from Sorrento to Mount Vesuvius was absolutely flawless and is definitely in my top 5. The view from the top, though, was practically spiritual.
The bus took us some of the way up the volcano, but we had to walk up a good portion of it. Enough for Jess and I (lagging behind) to nearly cry on the way up. Once we got to the top, we had a phenomenal view; we were so high up the clouds looked as though you could just reach out and grab one.
Climbing the volcano. The city you see in the background is Naples, which we went to on Monday (the day after this).
Looking into the volcano. I was really really hoping to see some lava and so I was disappointed.
I think ESCI1001 should go on a field trip here. Count me in.
Selfies for Dad! Notice my new necklace...it's made out of basaltic rock. Whaddup.
There is smoke. SMOKE. From the VOLCANO.
I wasn't kidding about the clouds. Like cotton candy basically.
Part Three: Love brought to you by my amazing best friends.
One more before heading back down.
We were only supposed to be on Vesuvius for 30 minutes. Well, we got screwed over by the ticket counter and therefore we had even less time than everyone else. Because of this, we decided to say screw it and we spend as much time as we wanted on the top. Stickin it to The Man just like my dad taught me (;
So after we had our fill of the gorgeous view (impossible, really) we walked back down the mountain and got in the bus to head to Pompeii. Outside the ruins is a bunch of street vendors so my friends ate lunch and went shopping and my broke butt watched. It's a good thing I can pretty easily appreciate beauty.
After lunch, we headed inside the ruins. We had a wonderful guide that was Italian but spoke very good English and I didn't struggle much understanding her accent. One of the best things about Italy was that everyone spoke English, but in a way it was so weird hearing it all the time when I was expecting to hear nothing but Italian. Leah attempted to teach me some before I left but I suspect her intentions were malicious.... Good thing I never used any of them! (;
The ruins were so cool. It was simultaneously hard and easy to imagine people living there thousands of years ago. While there, we learned that the only survivor was a man named Pliny the Younger, who saw the eruption from afar and later wrote about it to a historian. He was clearly in the right place at the right time. We also learned that the Romans who lived there had no idea that the mountain was a volcano; there was an earthquake about 18 years before the eruption happened and that probably contributed to the eruption. But overall the Romans were clueless. Bit of a surprise I'm assuming. Mount Vesuvius was actually three times taller then than it was now; the eruption was so explosive that most of the top of the volcano was blasted off.
Entering Pomeii
Inside someone's house.
They had a nice garden.
I love that you can still see the paintings in some places!
The town square.
One of the main streets.
More paintings! This one is in the food market.
The mummy looking thing is a plaster cast of someone who was buried under all the ash that consumed Pompeii. Most people who died in the eruption were suffocated by ash and poisonous volcanic gas.
A warehouse of vases and of course more body casts.
A scale in the town square
We also went into a brothel. Apparently it was like a catalogue of paintings and customers just pointed to the walls to tell people what they wanted. This is totally inappropriate and I hope my children never read this and ask questions.
A well. Apparently the water was supposed to come out of that guy's mouth.
Pompeii with Mt. Vesuvius. It looks so ominous.
Another view of the volcano.
On our way out.
The tour was absolutely amazing and I am so happy that I paid the extra money (sorry Dad) to see everything with the guide. After a long day of being out in the sun (YES!) we took our sunburnt selves back to the bus to get back to Sorrento. We were planning on going to the hotel pool afterwards, but it was little shady and cold. Also, I had to use that time to register for my fall classes. COOL. Just what I wanted to do on vacation. It's cool though, I'm not bitter.
That night was a barbeque in the hotel pool area that night. My friends all got food but I sustained myself on pretzels and joined them after. Apparently I wasn't missing much because food kept running out. Score another point for broke Caroline.
That night was really fun. We stayed in our room and just talked and laughed together. At the time I am writing this, I have said goodbye to both Kelsey and Jess, who left for America last Thursday. When I came to Ireland, I wanted to get attached to as little as possible, since I am terrible with goodbyes and always develop a blistering case of nostalgia very soon afterwards. Well I got super attached to these girls. That night in Sorrento just made me really realize how important friendship is. Each of us left everything to come study abroad; our whole lives, our friends, our families, to start over in a new country. I think being somewhat alone helped bond us together and it has really shown me how special your friends are. They're the family you choose, and I know these girls will be my sisters forever. I apologize for the super sappy post, but I don't care. "Love" really is the perfect title for this blog as I am truly going to love these girls forever.
That night we all fell asleep feeling loved. The next morning was our last day of the tour, so we had to completely pack up and come to terms with leaving Italy (something none of us wanted to do). That day we were spending a bit of time in Naples, the same city we overlooked when we were on top of Mount Vesuvius.
Naples kind of has a bad reputation, and once I got there I could see that a little bit. The one thing I noticed was that it was kind of, like, dirty. I'm not sure how to describe it but I didn't feel 100% safe there. Not like I felt safe in Rome either, but whatever. It was very unlike Capri and Positano.
The first thing we did when we got there was follow some guides to a castle right on the coast. It was GORGEOUS. I'm so happy we did it. On the way we got some great views of the coast and some really cool mountains.
In the main square. You can't really tell in this picture, but Naples was PACKED.
Yes that's Mount Vesuvius!
The castle, where all the following photos were taken.
On the other side of this railing, there were a group of kids swimming. The water was so clear and blue and I think My Strange Addiction should do an episode about me and this water which exists pretty much everywhere except America.
VESUVIO.
Caroline-Vesuvius selfie for Dad. Might be another good framed one
It was so beautiful here. Some random boy grabbed Kelsey and asked her if she was American. When she said yes, he insisted he take a picture with her. Probably one of the strangest things that happened on the trip.
Pizza pic courtesy of Jess.
With about an hour to go of the trip, disaster struck. We all went to go get cash from an ATM. Kelsey went first...aaaaaaaaaand her card got stuck in the machine. This is not a drill, people. Since it was Easter Monday, the bank was closed and we had no one to call to help us open it. So after some tears and panicky faces, Kelsey called her mom to cancel the card. Seriously, this girl cannot catch a break. But, she had enough for some food and the bus back from Dublin to Limerick, so it could have been much much worse.
While Kelsey was talking to her mom, I meanwhile purchased the best cappuccino of my entire life (I don't even like them that much, but this one was iced? IDK it was great) and later we headed back to the bus.
The bus ride back to Ciampino airport was about 3 hours and we just watched Entourage the whole way back.
We knew we would be staying over in the airport that night, as our flight wasn't until Tuesday morning at 11 and we didn't want to spend the money at a hotel. What we didn't account for was how completely terrible this idea was. We spent 19 hours at the airport, cold, tired, and crabby. It was the worst end to the trip possible, but so worth it. By the time we got back to Limerick, we spend a full 24 hours traveling. It was awful but I feel like it was necessary for us to learn that lesson. If you are considering sleeping overnight at a small airport, please save yourself and abstain from that.
Anyways, what's happened since then is a lot of final exams and goodbyes. I'm going to post one more blog about Ireland, and then most likely a series of blogs dealing with the Great European Adventure that my parents and I will be going on. They arrive in just two days and I am beyond excited to see them!
I'll write soon; also the video should be up shortly! Anymore questions for me? askcarolineireland@gmail.com
Slainte!
Caroline