Pompeii-City of Terror

We sailed overnight from Civitavecchia to Naples. Our guide Antonio was quite knowledgeable. He lives in Herculaneum, and has apparently done a great deal of study on his own about the events related to the various eruptions of Mt. Vesuvius. It was especially interesting to see a brothel that had recently been excavated. Very graphic direction signs carved into the street pointed the directions to the establishment. There were casts made by the volcanic ash of dogs and people frozen into statues in their last moments of terror. Amphorae were preserved as though they were new. Pompeii is a snapshot of the last moments of a major city experiencing the end of the world. We toured Pompei, visited a cameo factory store, then toured the Amalfi Coast by bus, stopping in Sorrento for lunch and some free time. Then a boat took us to the island of Capri. Of particular note was the Krupp estate, founded by the nineteenth-century German entrepreneur. Again we had no table mates at dinner on the ship.Read more