Naples or Pompeii & Pizza
If you’ve read from the beginning, you know in addition to Barcelona, Pompeii was one of the two things I was most pleasantly surprised at.
You do not need to do this on a Port Adventure. It is very easy to do on your own and ridiculously cheap.
First off, our port adventure routine. I’m 6’5” (just a hair under 2 meters for Non-US folk.) Except for disembarkation morning when they are closed, onboard, I always shower in the locker rooms at the gym/spa vs the stateroom. Both the spa, and the buffet had the same schedule on every port day. 90 minutes before all ashore, alarm would go off, and hit snooze. Get up, be outside of the gym one or two minutes before 60 minutes prior to all ashore and they would open. (we had a forward stateroom, so it was just an elevator ride up.) Quick shower and get ready and T-Minus 30 minutes the buffet would open. (it was always open when we arrived, so I think it opened earlier than published most days) so we would have breakfast. About ten minutes prior to All-Ashore we would head down and were surprised that every day, they would let us off when we got down.
Second general tip. In what was a HUGE improvement from all of my previous overseas adventures, we had switched to T-Mobile six or so months before when AT&T raised their rates on the iPhone unlimited plan for the second time in a year. So for the first time ever, I had cellular service internationally. True, it was slow speeds. I wasn’t going to stream Game of Thrones, but Google Maps worked perfectly and is a huge asset. Lastly, since we always planned to be onboard an hour before “all aboard” we could share a few pics from the iPhone on Facebook. Not advertising T-Mobile, but you are from the US, research your international data options. If you're saving $200 per person per day vs Port Adventures by traveling independently, perhaps one person springing for a $10 a day data plan could be money and piece of mind well spent.
So, between about 6:50 AM, we are on the streets of Naples. We put in the train station into Google Maps and off we went. The closer station is Porta Nolana station. It is also the end of the line of the Circumvesuviana train. In the station while waiting we met two fantastic people from the cruise ship who were also traveling independently. We hung out with them often throughout the trip and still keep in touch.
Here, we did have a bit of “when in Italy” moment. The first train was announced, we got on, about 5 minutes later they announced something in Italian, and everyone started getting off. Friendly local told us it was having mechanical issues. Eventually another platform was called and this time it took off.
I had prepurchased our Pompeii tickets. I went with the, if it could be purchased ahead of time, I did it, so less Euros and less lines to deal with. They scanned them at the gate without an issue. After reaching the forum, we again followed Rick Steve’s tour map. From the streets to the stores, to the sauna to the brothels, everything interesting. Tip we learned that day. The walking tour we followed hit most of the major sites. Guess what, those same sites are where tour guides would take their groups to also and about half of the tours were in English. We would never try to join a group or blatantly eavesdrop, but if I’m standing in a room and you walk in after me and start to explain the room loudly to your group…. This happened repeatedly as the tour groups seems to be on a quick schedule. The four of us would then share if we overheard different things.
We called this Pompeii's first pizza oven.
The sauna and the brothel were the two most complete buildings. We all had a laugh at the “menu” on the walls of the brothel as well as some of the neighborhood “artwork.” (sorry didn’t post any of those photos)
Our original plan today was Pompeii first, then go to top of Mt Vesuvius followed by pizza in Naples. Vesuvious was closed due to fires. So plan morphed into Pompeii, pizza, and then I was going to go to the Archaeological museum.
The tour route ended at the theatre. While we had enjoyed a peaceful visit to Pompeii, the tour buses had started to arrive. We exited out the theatre entrance and walked down the street back to the train station. Google maps to L'Antica Pizzeria da Michele. It was walkable from the Naples train station. We sent the smallest one to fight their way to door to get a number. (This is important, and how you join the queue. They ask how many and give you a number. He keeps the other half of the book and calls groups by number. It was about 45 minutes for a table, but well worth the wait.
Why Michele’s. We picked this one for pizza for three reasons. I believe they are the oldest, in the Rick Steve’s Naples episode this is where Rick goes to pizza, and I have a colleague from Italy, who said it’s the best. As long as you understand you’ll probably be waiting outside for almost an hour, I recommend you add it to your list. If looking to skip the wait, if you google best pizza in Naples 3 or 4 different websites list off many options. I’ve never seen the movie, but this is also where Julia Roberts has pizza in Eat Pray Love.
Menu is margherita pizza or marinara pizza and your choice of coke, beer or water (all drink options priced the same.) We by luck had a table where we could watch the pizza oven. The pizza was delicious. We all ordered the margherita. Maybe it was because we were speaking English, but they made it very clear they were expecting a tip. Honestly they were very friendly, the pizza was 4 euros and the drinks 2. I believe for 20 Euros total for both of us, out the door, we had a lunch and great memories.
At this point the plan, I’m going to the museum, Robert is going to the ship and Rain Forest room and our new friend also were going to the ship. We were walking to the metro station, and the skies opened up like someone just turned on a faucet. We all got drenched. We hailed a cab back to the ship. I would come back to Naples for Pizza and will catch the museum next time.
So, we Rainforest room. I know I spent some time in the jacuzzi by the adult pool. Looking ahead, we had prebooked Palo dinner reservations on Florence day. I want to try and see the “Snuggly Duckling Takeover” We swing by Palo and ask if we can change our reservation to Rome day. They said no problem, and we had a time within 30 minutes of the time we had booked, just a day earlier.
