Herculaneum, 6 June 2019

Up early to a sumptuous breakfast at he hotel. E were able to bring some cheese, salami, and pasties upstairs for our lunch. We headed to the Metro, got to the train station, and ... strike by CIcumvesuviana staff. So we went to another line, took a train which said it was going to Sorrento but instead stopped at the godforsaken San Giovanni Traduccio in the middle of nowhere. The place did not even look lik e a train station. we exited onto a street, decided to use the MyTaxi app to get a taxi, because the next train was an hour away.

We waited 20 minutes for a taxi, a fellow drive up, and got us out of the heavy Naples traffic, dropped us off at Herculaneum. The he charged us 5 times the amount quoted, so we will have to have an email exchange about that.

Nevertheless, here were were at Herculaneum, but a bit late. Then, another disappointment ...the boathouse where so many people tried to escape the eruption, was closed today, the one thing I really wanted to see. Alas. we headed to the new musuem on the way down, saw the exhibit of jewelry which was nice. We crossed the bridge down to Herculaneum, and it felt quite different than Pompeii. First, way fewer people, Second, many Prescott’s and Monica’s still in place, which were beautiful, Third, the area is not large most of it remains to be excavated) so you felt that you really got to see most of it. here were some beautiful views, the male and female baths were beautiful, and because the garden areas of the houses were still in place, you got a sense of how large and spacious these ones were. One of the largest was about 3,000 sf. The place really gave more of a sense of the way it was for people in their daily lives, and so much more has been recovered from Herculaneum than from Pompeii as it was covered in mud rather than ash. We had our salami and cheese next to the large Palestra, only slightly excavated. It was so quiet, few people around, really lovely.

We left Herculaneum about 3:30, walked upon to the train station, and got the Circumvesuviana apparently off strike) back to Naples. We changed to the Metro line. For the Archaeological Musuem directly. The Musuem holds most f the treasures recovered from Pompeii and Herculaneum, including mots of the frescoes and moscatos. It is also filled with nice Roman copies of Greek statues, as well as Egyptian artifacts. There were large numbers of wall panels form the various opuses. All pointed in the mustard yellow, terracotta, and sage green that are the colors I love. I took lots of photos of moscatos floors and wall frescoes in those colors for ideas.

After we closed it down at 7:00pm, we found a local place for dinner. The beautiful arcade Madeleine had told us about was closed because of falling debris. The restaurant was called Re Lazzarone. we started with some nice stuffed fried zucchini lessons, Barney had ravioli with provolone and pumpkin, and splits my perfectly-don’t salmon with him. We also split a chocolate mousse which was delicious, and they gave us each some delicious Limoncello.

A nice ending to along day. We headed back to the Metro, waited a long while for a train, then walked back up to the hotel. Showers and packing for tomorrow we leave for Sicily.