Italy-Day 5 (Pompeii and Naples)

We drove late at night and ended up in the little town of Castrovilla, near the top of the Calabrian region. We woke up the next morning late, as Catherine stayed up partying until almost 5am.

We set off for Pompeii, arriving around 4:30. We spent about two hours inside exploring. As a general comment, it wasn’t what I was expecting. There were no real descriptions inside of what we were looking at. The excavation is in various stages of completion everywhere, and the town is huge. While we did get audio guides, they were less than helpful, since a lot of the buildings the guides walked us through were closed off for whatever reason. As we were leaving, we did find a couple areas that were much more interesting.

First, we walked through a restored bath area. Interestingly, the skylight in the baths was in the perfect shape of a keyhole. Then, we walked past an area where there were recovered items from Pompeii being stored. Lots of sculpture, pots, and also a few plaster casts. According to the audio guide, the man in charge of the dig back in the mid-1800s was alerted by some of the workers that they had found bones at the bottom of a hole they uncovered. He stopped the work and mixed plaster of paris with water, filling the hole with the mixture. They carefully dug out the hardened plaster, and had unearthed the shapes of people who had died in the massive eruption. The plaster casts are eerily detailed, down to facial expressions.

Here’s some pictures detailing Pompeii and Naples.

First, the cutest picture of my daughter:

The theater at Pompeii (royalty sat in the marble seats nearest the stage):