After two full days of walking the streets of Rome we were ready for a more leisurely day. The plan was to drive down the Tyrrhenian coast to our next destination in the suburbs of Naples. Traffic heading to the autostrada was everything you hear about traffic in Rome. It took us 20 minutes to drive the few short blocks to the expressway. There was plenty of yelling and fist shaking that accompanied the Monday morning commute in Rome. Once we made it to the Autostrada it was just a 15 minute ride to the southwestern edge of Rome.

We decided to add one more tourist stop before leaving Rome - the ruins of Ostia Antica, located nearer the sea . Back on the local roads traffic was again quite slow. We made it to Ostia Antica by late morning, only to find the site was closed. (Note to self: always double check to make sure that sites are open, especially on a Monday!)

The trip along the coastline south of Rome was leisurely, even if a bit monotonous. We passed through one seaside village after another. Filled with villas and the associated public and private beaches, these are simply places for sun worshippers from Rome to escape during the summer. There wasn't anything particularly interesing about these villages, especially on the Monday after the last summer weekend. We drove south through Anzio, which seemed too commercial and congested to warrant a stop, and down the coast towards Campagnia. The scenery became a bit more rural and the coastline more rugged as we approched the Lazio/Campagnia border. We stopped in the village of Mellelo (near San Felice) for sandwiches at a general store . They had very tasty cheeses and meats, with excellent bread.

By now it was late in the afternoon and time to make our way to our destination for the day - San Sebastiano al Vesuvio. (Yes, that Vesuvio.) We hopped onto the expressway that leads to Naples and then took the connector road to the A1/A3 Autostrada. Our adventure began when we exited the Autostrada at San Germanio a Cremena. The B&B website only had directions from the local bus stop, so we grabbed directions from Mapquest. Unfortunately those directions were not much help either. We found Via Leonardo da Vinci, which was listed on our MapQuest directions, but it turns out that this was the wrong Leonardo da Vinci. (Apparently every neighborhood has its own Via Leonardo da Vinci. How do the fire departments know the difference?)

After half an hour of wandering around we stopped for directions. Unlike Rome, where language was not a significant barrier, it appeared that no one in this part of Naples speaks or understands English - at least not at the three gas stations where we stopped for directions. It took an old man (who seemed to know the way) a young woman (who allegedly spoke English - but only knew a few basic words and understood even less), and a woman (whose role seemed to be to direct the entire operation) to draw us a basic map to San Sebastian al Vesuvio. With the aid of their crude map and another half an hour of wandering around, we finally found our street.

We were not quite sure how we got there, nor exactly where we were, but we were glad to have found the house where we would be staying for the next three nights. We were also happy to learn that we could walk to a nearby restaurant for dinner.