Workshops

Thursday, October 16, 2008

Pompeii - Oh Wow!


Took the Circumvesuviana train to the Pompeii Scavi, Villa dei Misteri stop. Today was my birthday and the day we were visiting Pompeii, a lifelong dream. We spent five hours exploring the ruins and my word for the adventure is: WOW! We took dozens of photos, of which I'll post several here. A fun highlight was meeting Nancy and Jamie. Nancy was visiting from Wisconsin and travelling with her neice, Jamie. Jamie is a nurse in the Army stationed in Germany (and she had some suggestions for you, Chris, we'll talk later). Jamie has taken advantage of her time in Europe and is a pretty seasoned traveller. Anyway, Jamie and Nancy were following Rick Steve's tour of Pompeii and so were we. We kept bumping into each other so we decided it would be fun to explore together. A delightful decision! I'll explain a little more admist the photos below. But come along for a little tour of Pompeii - and happy birthday to me!



Although it appears that I am using a Pompeiian latrine, that is not the case:


The Basilica:

Howard in front of the tribunal, in the Basilica, the place where justice was administered!

A statue at the Temple of Apollo:

A plaster cast in the Forum Granary:

Pompeiian "fast food" restaurant:


One of the miles of streets:

The Temple of Isis:

With our new friends, Jamie and Nancy:

Red was still evident:

We met some more "new" friends, the "Germans."

Nancy had a dream of singing the Hallelujah chorus in an outdoor theatre and along with one of the Germans and Howard, they sang. Twice. This is the group after their "first" perforance:

The second time was an encore so some tourists could video record their performance!



Porta Ercolano: the Necropolis, with Jamie, Nancy, and myself striking a pose. Did I mention we really had fun with Jamie and Nancy?


A sobering experience, the Garden of the Fugitives:

Some of the amazing artwork still visible on the walls:

Oh, and we did visit the Pompeii brothel, but no photos to post . . . all the "good" stuff is on view at the Archaeological Museum (Museo Archeologico) in Napoli. And there we DID take photos. Stay tuned Bob and Louise . . .


As we wait for our train to take us back to Sorrento, Jamie and Nancy wave their farewells from the opposite track, the one taking them to Rome . . .



We ate a late lunch at Sant' Antoniono's (where Howard had seafood pizza!):



2 comments:

gl. said...

wow. i had never heard of "the Garden of the Fugitives." yeep!

Anonymous said...

You all are having so much fun...it must be so amazing to see things that are actually ancient. There's nothing here in the US that really compares historically speaking. I'm glad I caught up on your adventures.....