Paestum!!! Wow!!!

One half hour, 2.90 euros each way, and the Regionale train takes you to Paestum, the ruins of a Greek city from about 5th century BC. Three large temples remain intact, with the residential area, forum, baths,theater in ruins. One of the temples is roped off, but you can walk throuh the other two. Amazing.

We had bright sunny, cold weather (in fact, on the way back to the train, a few snowflakes started to fall). Crowds were very moderate —two big groups of American college students, one tour bus of Italians, and about 50 others like Joe and I, straggling along on our own.

The museum had many artifacts from graves, and some of the painted grave slabs themselves, including one that appears to be quite famous, The Diver. Lots of urns, statues of gods and goddesses, with very nice information panels, in both Italian and English for a change.There was a short video about the Allies´ WWII invasion, Operation Avalanche, which took place near Paestum. The Brits brought their own archaeologist, and while constructing an airstrip, an ancient burial site was found (by ancient, I mean really ancient, like Iron Age). He documented it all, excavated and tagged all artifacts. Turned them over to the Napples Archaeological authorities at the end of the war. The film ended with a comment along the lines of — it is a treasure for humanity that the British realized that preserving ancient history was just as important as winning the war.

This is the end of the planned trip. When I was buying the plane tickets, it seemed like a shame to get on a plane in Rome without spending some time there. So we have a hotel reservation for four nights, an old Michelin Rome guide from our 1995 trip with the kids, and a recent 36 Hours in Rome article. Just hoping to have good weather for walking and short lines in front of whatever we decide to visit.Lue lisää