Ruins, drive, Sorrento

Saturday, 25 June

Our early start was not so early. We woke up at 9:30, which meant we had to rush into the breakfast that closed at 10. The breakfast was typical Italian - lots of sweets. Anders and I just made a simple ham and cheese sandwich and tried some of the sweets.

We had a bit of debate whether or not we should drive towards Pompeii and pay for parking or just leave the car at the hotel. I convinced Anders it might be expensive to park so we left the car. I was totally wrong. It costs only €1 an hour!

Pompeii was very interesting. We rented audio guides to learn about it, but after about 3-4 chapters I got bored of it. Anders was very determined to not miss anything important. The Vesuvius ashes buried the city back in 79 AD. It was discovered in the 1500s when workers found a cavity while digging an underground channel. In the 1700s they started excavating it. The way they did it was to pour plaster into the molds created by the ashes and then chip away the outer surface. It's amazing how you can actually see people's facial expressions. The
ruins itself was actually phenomenal. It's crazy to see how the city was built so many years ago. We saw a very wealthy person's house, a theater and the sports arena. All very fascinating.

After three hours at the ruins we headed back to the hotel to begin out drive to Sorrento. I made a pit stop at the bathroom to clean off my very nasty dusty feet. It was covered in dust. A true sign of going to the ruins.

The drive to Sorrento was extremely nice. We drove along the coast and every town we passed intrigued us on whether or not we had reached our destination. It took about 45 mins to get to our bed and breakfast called Diane city. It was pretty central. Just the end of the main
street. The room was clean and charming. For €70 a night, it was definitely worth it. The receptionist was also very nice. She gave us recommendations for dinner, drinks and ice cream.

We ate at Ruccio by the marina. On the walk there we had to climb down a long set of steep stairs. Anders was not so happy when I tried to pull him to the edge. He's extremely afraid of heights. He felt much more grounded when we got to the bottom. We hopped and sang our way to the marina.

We had a table right on the edge of the dock facing the ocean. It felt very exclusive and intimate. We had a fantastic time. It wasn't so expensive too. For €110 we had two entrees, two mains, two 50cl wines, two coffees, and two baileys. Everything was excellent. Even the house
wine for €8.

Since it was Saturday and we were big losers on the Friday night, we partied it up. We started out at a karaoke bar. It was tons of fun doing sing alongs and dancing. Afterwards we went to the fruit bar. Man was this bar awesome. Many people were sitting outside, but I wanted to stand by the bar inside. The bartenders made different drinks based on your fruit of choice. But first we had to ask if they took cards and they didn't. So we had to go to an ATM. To entice us to return, they said free shots on them when we return. They gave us shots of extremely chilled stoli. Yummm. I had a passion fruit drink and Anders had a black currant. Man it was sooo delicious. We are totally going back tomorrow.

After that we went to one more bar where Anders ordered Budweiser!!!! So touristy! We walked our way home drunk and passed out horizontally on the bed until the next morning.