Day 40 – 4th June . Pompeii-> Bari->At Sea

Day 40 – 4th June . Pompeii-> Bari->At Sea

We had a sleep in today until 7am, never got that on the France tour! Have to say that this tour is a great pace, we only had that one long day on the bus and its been pretty cruisey since. Most days we have only had 4-6 hours on the bus and some hardly any.

The tour had been great so far and while the TD is longwinded (at his own admittance), to give him his dues – he gives you lots of info and its always willing to point you in the right direction when you need help. Timekeeping is also much improved. He certainly does more than he needs to.

Today we say goodbye to Ferdinando our bus driver – he is a real sweety and is a gentleman to boot, we are all sad to say goodbye- but we tip him well for all his hard work. Álso have included a pic today of someone you might recognize- Robert De Niro was working at the hotel we stayed at – undercover for his latest movie!!! We blew his cover.

We then went into town to an inlaid wood factory that would blow you away. It is the only place in the world where they practice this particular hand crafting of wood. They cut out all the designs with a very fine coping saw and then glue all the pieces back into it. Then there is an intricate process that is so time consuming to come up with the original hand crafted pieces. We all fell in love with the furniture and other pieces and I bought the most beautiful large cherry wood jewellery box that has an old pianolla style music disc inside that plays different tunes. There have only been 6 of these made and will be a great heirloom for the girls one day too.

We left the hotel at 8.30am and travelled for a couple of hours out of Sorrento and to Pompeii. Its great to not have to worry about anything, no parking or buying tickets. Got our local guide who took us all through the ruins. They were amazing- 2/3’s of Pompeii have been excavated and that has taken 200 years! There were 3000 shops there, so it was a hub of trade. It was a similar feeling there to the Coliseum – eerie and awesome.

Went through the brothel – the paintings on the walls were pretty explicit!! We were surprised how many paintings there were in the city that had survived- mostly painted in ochre. It is all sitting against the backdrop of Mt. Vesuvius – the mountain which erupted 24 August, 79 A.D. You wonder how a huge city like this could simply disappear and be lost for over a hundred years before being accidentally re- discovered when people were excavating to build.

It got so hot while we were there- never happy! Drenched one day, sweating like mad the next! Wandered around a little longer though, enjoying this amazing site, although it is sad to see there are stray dogs there that have been dumped and they look lost and aren’t in good condition with no one to feed them regularly.

We looked at the stalls outside and had lunch then back onto the bus for 4 hours to the sea port of Bari where we boarded our “superfast” ferry. This is a surprisingly upmarket ship – only 6 years old and as flash as the cruise ship Pacific sky we have been on.
Michael had got in early and secured us all outside cabins- great! Had dinner in the restaurant – 4 courses and very nice, washed down with some german beer that comes in a 500 ml bottle! A great day today- Goodbye to Italy – have loved it here and having the week before in Tuscany really set the tone!