The holidays are over, and it's officially the slog of January. This means that we need to go on vacation!
Two years ago, we spent an early January weekend in Venice; without the misery-inducing crush of tourism, it was actually lovely. So this January (late last night, to be exact) we headed to another typically overcrowded Italian destination that I would normally avoid like the plague: Naples.
Naples is famous for a lot of things, including pizza, Pompeii, and for creating America's enduring stereotype of "Italy." This is because between the end of World War II and the 1970s, millions of Italians, mainly from this region, fled poverty and fascism and settled permanently in the US. So all the Hollywood characters, cuisine, and Dean Martin songs that Americans think of as "Italian" are actually just from this southern region.
Our original plan was to spend a quick weekend here, visiting the famous ruins of Pompeii. However, Vueling Airlines canceled our Friday evening flight from Barcelona, and rescheduled it to depart three days earlier. So with the extra days, we decided to spend one of them in Naples. Given Naples's reputation as a grimy, crime-ridden city, we figured that one day was all we needed. (For the record, Naples has a lot of graffiti and garbage, but other than that it's safe and kinda cool.)
Naples is a massive, ancient city. It's one of the most densely populated cities in Europe, and has been inhabited since the Greeks moved in around the second millennium BC. So that's a shit ton of stuff to see in a single day, but we were gonna do it or die trying. Or while eating a lot of cream pastries. Something like that.
We started our day at the huge Naples Archaeological Museum, which houses the exquisitely preserved mosaics and art recovered from the volcanic ruins of Pompeii. We've seen impressive mosaics in Cyprus and Greece, but none were so amazingly pristine and colorful as Pompeii's. Who knew volcanic ash was such a great preservative- perhaps I should add it to my skin care regimen.
The museum included rooms full of massive, ten-foot-tall statues recovered from Pompeii, and a "Secret Room" filled with Pompeii's phallic and erotic art. This art was deemed too immoral for modern viewing until 2000, when Naples realized the innate value of charging tourists 18 euros to look at a ancient dick pics.
In the final Pompeii exhibit was a (terrifyingly) huge scale model of Pompeii's ruins. Given that we're visiting the ruins this week, the enormity of the model left me with a bit of dread. It appears I've committed to quite an exhausting day trip, which may clash with my general laziness and penchant for an early aperitivo hour. Anyway.
We passed the entirety of the day on a walking exploration of the city. Naples, like much of Italy, has more historical churches lying about than you can (or want to) see in a single day; but nevertheless, we were amazed by the beauty of the Duomo (Naples's cathedral), Santa Chiara, and Gesú Nuovo. Naples is also filled with castles- before the unification of Italy in the 19th century, Naples had its own royalty, and at random times was ruled by Spanish and French kings. So castles were kind of necessary.
We visited three of them: The Royal Palace, the medieval Castel Nuovo, and the hilltop fortress of Castel Sant Elmo. Sant Elmo was particularly cool, not just for its breathtaking views of Mount Vesuvius, but because it's accessible via a funicular! And nothing puts the "fun" in a vacation like a funicular, particularly when a hundred-year-old one comes to an eerie, elongated halt in a dark tunnel, just moments after I wonder aloud how often passengers get trapped in it.
After hours of exploring piazzas, churches, ancient streets, castles, and museums (and pastry shops), by 6pm we were ready for aperitivo hour. Later, we were too exhausted to go for dinner, so at 10pm we did a very Neapolitan thing and just got a takeout pizza.
Tomorrow we head south to Sorrento on the Amalfi Coast!
2025-02-13