Disaster averted...

So we're heading out to B.F.E. to pick up the vehicle Leslie allegedly rented. We have to take the funicular up the hill, to the subway, and the subway to some outlying suburb (Capidimonte something or other), where we exit the train station, ask the attendant where in the hell we should head now. He hooks us up with a chatty lady in a yellow dress who tells us to get on the bus with her and she will guide us (at least that's what we think is happening). The bus takes off, we go a few blocks, and she tells us to get off the bus, and she leads the way. We step off the bus, stand there a minute, and the bus driver starts yelling...something like 'what the hell are you thinking?'...so we get back on the bus with the lady in yellow, go a few blocks more, and disembark once again. She points to the street nearby, and we stroll a few blocks to find our car rental place, incredibly.

We present ourselves and our papers and the sweet girl behind the counter asks Leslie, 'may I see your driver's license?' But, you see, Leslie does not have his drivers license, even though he is renting a car and planning to drive it that very day. He has left it in his hotel room, for some reason (I've got some theories). This means we will have to retrace our labored steps back to Pinto Storey Hotel on the other side of town, without the help of the yellow lady. Alas, the sweet counter girl is cleverer than the two panicked and bitter fools, and calls the hotel to ask the clerk to locate Leslie's drivers license, make a copy, and fax it to her. The clerk does so..but the fax is illegible. All the while, I feel the clock ticking, and the possibility of my seeing Pompeii and Herculaneum sliding away...Leslie asks, 'Are you mad?' 'No,' I tell him, 'just disappointed' and I grit my teeth.

The clerk steps up and decides to hail a taxi and send the legible copy of the drivers license to us in B.F.E. So we wait another 45 minutes, and he appears. He shouts a little bit about the fare (he thinks we are challenging it but we're just trying to figure out how much the damned fare is). We pay him 14 Euro and soon we are on our way.

Our 'car' is a Toyota something or other, with four doors and not much else. It has, in name only, an air conditioner. And we're not sure which gear is which, but we have decided after trial and error to drive in 'E'. Only, we get lost constantly in Naples trying to find the Autostrade (the highway). Eventually, we run blindly into it and head out of town. Leslie is giddy that we have survived the first 45 minutes of driving with only one mirror hit.

We soon (sooner than we thought it would be) find Pompeii. In the course of the first 35 seconds of being there, we are coerced into a parking space in front of a restaurant and sold a guide book and told we should not eat in Pompeii but at the restaurant, as it is cheaper. Oy vay.

Pompeii is sprawling, and hot, but spectacular. We take the audio tour and even though most of the commentary does not quite match up with the physical layout (he says turn left, and there is no left), we hit what we think are the high points, including the House of the Fawn (mentioned in Leslie's first Latin textbook), which contained the original of the mosaic we saw in the Archeol. Museum of Alexander defeating Darius, House of the Tragic Poet (with a doggy mosaic in the doorway), the baths, which were very nicely preserved, featuring great mosaics (you gotta love those bathhouse terms: the frigiderium, the calidarium...oh, and every house features an impluvium in the foyer, which is a shallow pool to catch the rainwater from a hole in the roof) and, on more grisly note, a few plaster casts of 'bodies' of Pompeiians who died when Vesuvio blew and pelted poor Pompeii with ash, rocks, lava, and fire. Leslie also insisted that we visit the whorehouse to see the erotic graphics (the stone beds, by the way, were incredibly short...were they that much shorter, or were they more supple and creative?) Vesuvio, incidentally, looms over everything, keeping an eye on things.

Exhausted and hot, we nevertheless headed to Herculano (Leslie kept asking, 'Do you really want to go?'). But not before a quick lunch, worthy of comment: it is amazing what these people do with a simple sandwich. A hunk of good french bread (hard enough to cut your palate), a thin, thin slice of salami, a slab of mozarrela, a tomato or two, and you're in heaven). And it's cheap.

Herculano is odd because it sits in the middle of town. You hurl your Toyota Spritz or whatever it is off the Autostrade, take a curve, and hit a stop light, behind which sits an arch that reads Herculaneum. It sits next to drug stores, cafes, tabacco shops...you head inside, and spread out beneath your feet are the ruins, which you reach by walking down an incline and crossing over a pit of 50=60 feet to the city proper. Herculaneum was found in the 1700s by some guy who bought an estate nearby, and they've been digging at it ever since. It was covered by mud when Vesuvio blew, so it is better preserved than Pompeii. The street level is about 40 feet blow today's streets, so it is clear that it took a LOT of digging. Lots of walls remain, and many roofs, along with incredibly ornate interiors (although Herculaneum's baths did not begin to compare with Pompeii's in glamour terms...take that Herculaneum). It's too much to take in, really, particularly if you're 50 years old, your feet hurt, and your ass is dragging (it didn't help that I tripped on a rock left by some damned ancient, and fell over it and into a fence, where I hit my bad shoulder...Leslie helped save my camera, however).

Leslie and I had a question for the experts out there (Eric?): how does an ancient city get covered up by 30 or 40 feet of dirt? (Herculaneum got covered by volcanic mud...that's easy. But what about Ancient Rome, for example.) Anyone?

We made it back to our hotel, incredibly, without incident. Leslie was even giddier at that point, very proud of himself and his driving abilities. We are off down the coast and across the ferry and into Sicily, to Taormina, today!

A few random observations before I go:

Naples is cheaper than Roma, which I hope signals a trend as we head south. I will admit to having spent $65 on cokes, wine, and ice cream at the Piazza Navona (of course you're paying for the fact of being in and getting to watch the Piazza). Our dinner last night (including wine and meat!) was only 40 Euro.

We thought we were not that obvious, but it has become clear that we are perceived readily as Americans. (My blue baseball cap doesn't help.) Not that that's bad. One guy in Rome told us how great America was...yeah, sometimes. But we want to be regarded as citizens of the world, dammit.

I miss my beloved Tony (my Vespa). The constant stream of scooters only makes my pain worse.

A German man was either flirting with me from a table across the piazza or he couldn't believe how big my head is. Leslie and I couldn't decide.

And, Kelly, I have tried to get Leslie to write or comment, but as you may know he has the attention span of a gnat, and twitches to get away from the computer. I will try again.