Vesuvius/Pompeii

Aimee: Ciao, buonasera! We write to you tonight from the Mediterranean Sea. We have left the Port of Salerno and are now sailing toward Venice. The trip should take a day and a half. We are exhausted and definitely ready for a day at sea. Tonight for your reading pleasure all four Allens will be alternating paragraphs. We’ll start with Mike, the old mountain goat. Being a Colorado boy he had a certain vision of Vesuvius looming in the distance and well, it might not have immediately measured up…

Mike: I was not impressed with Mt. Vesuvius until…we reached the summit. The size of the crater was astonishing. It was amazing to think that mother earth could expel that much land in such a short period of time.

Madison: It was a three mile hike total, going up and down the mountain (from the place where the bus dropped us off). The view was incredible! Looking down you could see the city of Naples and if you looked in the right area you could also see Herculanium. The hike was tiring, but worth it.

Max: Before the trip I researched Mt. Vesuvius. I couldn’t pronounce it; I called it Mt. Vanchewvius and stuff like that. Anyway, I found out that it is the third largest volcano on Earth. We definitely didn’t start our hike at the bottom. The views nearby and at the top were stupendous.

Aimee: While we were at the beautiful summit we noticed an Australian camera crew filming. We were shushed and hushed while they did their thing. We have no idea what it was about, but we hope to find it on the internet at some point. Maybe we’ll hear some background conversations like Maddee saying “Mom where can I put my pear core,” or Max saying “Are they checking for eruptions?” Those quotes will promptly be followed by several loud “SHHH”s from stern adults.

On to Pompeii

Mike- when asked to contribute to his paragraph about Pompeii, he looks up sleepily from his pillow and gives a thumbs-up. I guess that sums it up for him. (This will mark the second night that he has fallen asleep while we are working on our blog-or the third night or maybe even the fourth night).

Madison: After getting ice creams and pizzas we entered the gates to Pompeii. There were lots of trees and flowers some were bright pink, some were a great shade of purple. Archeologists actually figured out what plants they had in Pompeii before it was covered in volcanic ash. After finally walking in to the actual sight a big building that looked similar to the colosseum style (same building materials) loomed before my eyes. It was amazing you could actually go into one of the houses. Unlike the colosseum, which is supposed to have a bunch of cats living in it, we actually saw animals in Pompeii…

Max: When we entered the building of an important person, we walked about two feet in and looked to the left. We saw pretty much an empty room, if you took another step and looked to the left you saw a room that had mostly faded, chipped paintings on the wall and when you looked down to the corner you saw a dog! A cute dog that was used to people. He was in there to keep from the blazing sun. He never barked and was always nice. There was a room with bones in a case. There were plenty of skulls in it. We moved on and saw more dead, blech! They were completely covered in plaster so you couldn’t see their bones, which is better than just a couple of skeletons. Right beside one of them was another dog! Across the room there was another dog! Going right into the next room which was connected to that room there was… a bathhouse. There was a lot more than that in the house, but we didn’t go everywhere in the house because it was huge!

Aimee: Okay, let me fill in some of the details here. Pompeii was really awesome. The city, as you likely know was covered in ash, pumice and lava after a terrible eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD. The city was not unearthed until sometime in the 1700s. Mike and I were expecting a small village with some ruins, but we were both impressed to find it was a rather large Roman city. Much of the city was still in tact including some frescos on the walls, some wood and unfortunately the skeleton remains of many of the residents of Pompeii. We all appreciated the tour, but it was definitely a hot, hot day in a city with very little shade. As Max said at one point when the sun was beaming down on us, “The only thing that would make this worse is if we were carrying torches.” For me the whole city with its houses, shops, amphitheaters and cobblestone streets was impressive. However, I was most impressed with the huge forum and the ruins in that particular area.

 

Our tour ended with some free samples of limoncello for the adults (candies for the kids) and a few minutes of free time. We took the opportunity to get a slush or another gelato (big surprise) and then headed to the bus. We were leaving the parking lot when we noticed that one of the members of our tour group didn’t make it back to the bus. We drove around until we found the poor guy who seemed utterly embarrassed. When he boarded the bus everyone clapped and cheered for him. I bet he will never forget his visit to Pompeii. I know we won’t forget ours.