Judith's blog

Having only the morning in Naples, I wanted to see the National Archaeological museum, where all the finds from Pompeii, Herculaneum and other Roman sites are held. We got up early to be able to be there at 9am, but first we had to negotiate Monday morning rush hour in Naples. A Swiss woman whom we got chatting to on Vesuvius told us that in Naples a pedestrian’s life was worthless. That is an understatement. There is a pecking order which goes something like this car > bus > moped > pedestrian. Nobody is stupid enough to ride a bicycle in Naples.

Crossing a road was a major undertaking. Zebra crossings are a waste of paint. No one stops at them. I saw the whites of more drivers’ eyes that you can imagine. It took us a while to suss out how it works. Basically, if you look for a gap and then scuttle across the road, this brings out the hunter instinct in the drivers. Never run! If you just step out and walk across with panache, they stop – probably only because blood stains are so tricky to get off the paint work. They see you off with a feisty toot of their horn though.

The museum was brilliant, although some of the exhibits we were looking forward to were out on loan or had been taken away for restauration. What a treasure trove though. It would have been amazing to see all the mosaics, paintings and statues in situ at Pompeii.

We headed back to the train station and Naples is even dirtier than Ercolano. There was a refuse collector strike in Naples a few years ago, but it would be difficult to see the difference, since the locals don’t seem to mind the streets being full of litter the rest of the time.

On getting to Rome airport we went through the gate and had to board a bus to be taken to the airplane. The bus drove in a circle around the plane depositing us just 20 meters from where we had boarded the bus in the first place. This seemed a surreal safety precaution given the traffic fun we had had in Sorrento and Naples!

See photos of today.

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