Last night we went to Ciro’s for dinner, which was listed in the GF guide to Italy bo0k. Unfortunately they couldn’t offer me GF pizza unless we’d phoned in advance, but they had pasta. I had a seafood pasta with clams, baby octopus, prawns, mussels, tomato and olive oil. Delish! We had a white wine to go with dinner, and dessert. How temping is this dessert stand? They wheel it over to your table so you’re FORCED to have something. I had a strawberry panna cotta which was looovely.
Pompeii
It was fabulous. We opted to wander around by ourselves rather than paying for a tour guide (what is an antiquities professor doing taking tours around Pompeii for anyway? Shouldn’t he be researching??) so we relied on our maps and guidebooks given out by the tourist office.
The first big omg moment was when we went to the villa dei misteri, a large house that is in the process of being restored. Here’s one of the impluvia in an ante-room (there was a huge one in the centre of the house, too). It had frescoes still visible on the walls, and mosaic floors.
The valley it was being dug out of was being re-planted in the original style, using pomegranates and creeping rosemary along the banks.
The theatre and amphitheatre were fantastic – really well preserved.
We had lunch at the cafe within Pompeii (really ancient Roman! If ancient Romans had plastic trays and chips…) which was relatively reasonable, considering they had a monopoly! My plate of grilled vegies and bottle of diet coke was 6E. Not too bad.
After four hours of wandering the hot, dusty streets, we were all quite ready to go home, via the book shop, of course! Although somewhat sunkissed, we all agreed that it was a really fantastic day. It’s not every day you can be transported back nearly 2000 years. Just remember to wear walking shoes (comfy ones!) and bring lots of water.
Two Weeks Away 