Chasing the Sun

Yay 4 day weekend! As excited as I am about a 4 day weekend I am also really sad that it is our last weekend before the semester ends. For our bitter sweet celebration we chased the sun down to the Amalfi Coast on Thursday. When we got there Thursday night we put our stuff down at the hostel and headed straight out toward city center. At some point we turned down a side street and found an empty pizzeria, so we went in. The two guys working there were young Italian guys who were eager to show some Americans a good time. Pasquale, the 19 year old waiter started making drinks for us mixing gin and beer, corona and tequila, beer and vodka, etc. They also made us some fried eggplant and mozzarella along with deep fried grilled cheese. Yum! So basically that we our first night in Sorrento.

Friday we had a private boat tour planned leaving from Sorrento, where we were staying, to Capri and back. It left at 9:30, stopped at Capri for about 2 hours before heading back to the harbor around 5. A cab picked us up from the hostel and took us down to the harbor where we met our Captain and Bruno, the first mate. It was a beautiful 40' boat just big enough for our crowd of 7 plus 5 other girls who are studying in Barcelona. It was already warming up nicely when we headed out to Caprie which was nice because all 7 of us wore our bathing suits. Finally my bathing suit got to see a little sunshine and salt water!!! Even though there was rain in the forecast we still managed to all get a little color. We cruised around the Sorrento coast line toward Capri and stopped in a few places so we could see the many grottos between the rocks. From the boat we also had a really great view of Mt. Vesuvius!! At one point, near the ruins of an old Roman aqueduct we decided to swim. We jumped off the back of the boat and into the ice cold water. I only went in twice simply to say that I swam in the Mediterranean. I needed to lay in the sun for a good while to bring up my body temperature. We cruised around the island of Capri near these famous rocks. One has an arch way under it so naturally we went through it. At one point we anchored the boat to swim but I was too content laying in the sun to even move far enough to take pictures. I have learned that sometimes you just have to put down the camera and take it all in for yourself because no matter how hard you try a camera can't capture the moment as well as a memory can. We also made our way over the the famous Blue Grotto which, as luck would have it, was closed due to the high tide. The only way to get in was to swim through so there went everyone but me, swimming into the grotto. I do not like cold water and the swim was far to long for me to pretend to grin and bear it the whole way there. I do not regret my decision to say in the boat. About the time the 6 of them made it to the entrance a tourist boat came by and everyone started taking pictures of the silly Americans who were swimming as well as the 6 of us who were on the boat. It was kind of comical!

We made it to Capri around 2 and got off to walk around the city. It's pretty small but very exciting. I was surprised by the amount of high-end retail shops that were there. The number of tourist however was no real surprise. We got some gelato, took pictures, met Americans and then went back to the boat at 4:30 to finish the cruise. On the way back I asked Bruno if I could take the wheel for a bit and he had no problem handing it over. He told me where to go and left me to it for about 15 minutes. I was loving it!!! When we got back to the harbor in Sorrento a can was waiting for us to take us back to the hostel. We hated to leave especially after such an awesome day but we were all getting a little burned and hungry so back to the main land we went. For dinner Julia, Ross and I found a restaurant near the main square and had a great pizza and tiramisu. Of course, when in Southern Italy, we got complementary limoncello shots with the check. At 8:30 in the street Sorrento has two processions for Easter. There was one Thursday night, the Procession of Our Lady of Sorrows and then Friday, the Procession of the Crucified Christ. It went all the way around the city and then finished back at the church around 11. It was very cool to see and a nice Italian man explained the history and significance of the procession. We watched it leave from the church, grabbed a few drinks and then watched it come back into the city and enter the church before heading back to the hostel.

Saturday we took the bus from Sorrento to the town of Amalfi for a few hours. The road to Amalfi is carved out of the side of the cliffs and its a straight drop down into the water so that part was kind of scary. There is not much to do or see in Amalifi on a rainy day other than a cool church. We all bought some bottles of limoncello and looked at some tiles that are native to the region. Julia and I had our afternoon glass of vino rosso before going back to Sorrento. Dinner was probably the best part of the day because we went to a mozzarella bar and had a mozzarella platter and focaccia bread for dinner. It was SO GOOD and actually pretty filling. The night ended back at Pasquale's pizzeria, he actually closed early just so he could hang out with us so that was nice.

Sunday was a lot more exciting and had better weather. Despite it being Easter Sunday there were actually a lot of people out and shops open when Julia and I left for Pompeii! I was really hoping to have the chance to go to Rome for Easter or at least go to mass but obviously neither one of those worked in my favor. That's alright, I'll have something to come back for! Anyway, Pompeii was awesome. We walked through the ruins for about 3 hours and enjoyed the last bit of sunshine we will see before going back to Northern Italy. It was cool to see everything I had learned about in my high school laying class. I knew I would get something out of 4 years of Cober's lessons! Some of the mosaics and frescoes were actually very well preserved but I was surprised by the lack of "restrictions" in Pompeii. The only think that separated me from the ruins was a worn down piece of caution tape or a rickety wooden gate. I could have easily stepped over and there was no once there to enforce the rules, but I still obeyed them. Toward the end of the day we headed to the Napoli airport for our flight back to Venice. The trains had stopped running by the time we landed and the cab rides that were outside were so expensive so we called our Italian Dad who is also the owner of the Pizzeria to come pick us up. It was a long weekend and I was happy to come home a day early and have all day Monday to study for exams. I also needed that Monday to book a flight home to the USofA and make my travel plans in between....