Naples - Day 8

Our flight home was at 10.15am. We packed up and left the apartment, and drove to the Automania depot to return the car.

Unfortunately this involved driving through the Naples rush hour, where the traffic was even madder than usual. We made it alright though, and handed the car back with no problems.

The shuttle bus took us to the airport, and it was quite straightforward getting through security.

The flight was a little late in taking off, but they made up the time and we landed at Edinburgh before 1pm.

After collecting the car from the long term car park, we drove straight to the kennels to pick up Oscar, then home.

Naples - Day 7

With better weather we decided to drive to the Amalfi coast again. We drove straight to Amalfi town, using the toll motorways to save a bit of time.

We intended to do a walk up the gorge at the back of the town, so drove through the narrow streets to try to find a parking place. Unfortunately the place was heaving with tourists, and there wasn't a single place to be found where we wanted to go.

We had to head back to the seafront, and parked in the very expensive car park there for an hour, so we could at least see a bit of the town. We had a little walk around the centre then up a path with views to the next cove along.

We decided to drive inland and uphill to Scala, in hope that it would be easier to park and we'd actually be able to do a decent walk. This worked out very well, we got a good free parking space and did a nice walk along a fairly level path to a waterfall.

There were good views back down to Amalfi.

We reached the waterfall and ate our lunch, then made our way back by the same route.

Back at the car we drove back towards Naples. It started raining but we were determined to stop somewhere to buy an ice cream. We actually found a great local place on the way, and got delicious ice creams for two euros each.

Back at the apartment we got ready for our last night out. We went to In Pasta Veritas just along the road. To start with we shared a Burratella salad - made with Burrata cheese and tomatoes.

For the main course Scott had Genovese pasta (beef and onion ragout) and Shirley had Caprese pasta (tomatoes, mozarella and basil).

Naples - Day 6

We went to Vesuvius today. We booked the car park space online, but you can't book tickets for actual entry to the volcano walk unless you're connected to the Wi-Fi hotspot at the entrance half way up the mountain. This meant we were taking a bit of a risk that we wouldn't be able to get in.

(You can book in advance online, but the advance tickets get sold out quickly. There were none available for our whole stay when we looked weeks ago.)

We drove to the parking area, then had a 2 kilometre walk up the road to get to the entrance.

We were nice and early, so when we found the Wi-Fi hotspot and connected to it, there were loads of tickets for today available. When we came back down we saw there was quite a crowd there so I don't know if we'd have been quite so lucky if we'd left it till much later.

We then started the climb. It's an ash path that takes you to the rim of the volcano, with great views down to Naples and the coast.

We made it to the rim and walked all the way round. The rock formations are pretty spectacular.

We had good views to Sorrento down the coast and the island of Capri.

Inside the crater there were still some steaming vents, even though it hasn't erupted since 1944.

We walked back down, and we could see that the entrance area was getting very busy.

We returned to the car and drove down the road a bit to another walk, this time to a "river of lava".

We still had plenty of time left in the day, so we decided to drive to the north of Naples and have a walk on Monte Nuovo, a much older volcano.

Down the other side was a picturesque lake, Lago d'Averno. We walked round a bit of it, as far as a ruined Roman temple.

After making our way back to the car we drove home to the apartment.

Later for dinner we made fish fingers and chips.

Naples - Day 5

At last the weather has improved. After breakfast we drove to the car park at Pompeii, about half an hour away.

We entered the city and spent the whole day walking round, it was very interesting.

We went into the old tannery.

We came across a grape vine that still had grapes on it.

There were a few plaster casts of the body cavities that were discovered in the ash.

There's a large amphitheatre.

We went round a raised walkway in a covered area where they're currently excavating.

We visited one of the bath houses.

We walked out to a couple of suburban Roman villas which are an extra part of the visit. We passed a few nice cats on the way, and some pomegranate trees.

Back in the city, it was interesting to see the grooves worn in the roads from many years of chariots using them.

One of the other buildings we went into was a brothel, which had pretty uncomfortable looking stone beds.

After spending about six hours walking round Pompeii, we drove back to the apartment and walked down to one of our local cafés for a drink.

Later for dinner we went out to a local takeaway kebab shop, and had a selection of their kebabs.