Pompeii and Circumstance

I'm so proud of myself for the title of this blog post, but M never finds my puns as funny as I do. After Cinque Terre, I was so excited to visit Pompeii (which I've always wanted to do but never have before), so when I saw it was an option from our stop in Naples I booked it early. I remember learning in school about this fascinating and tragic city buried under volcanic ash, providing the most complete preservations of ancient Roman life we have in modernity.

I learned so much on my tour, including the fact that archaeological research is still ongoing on these 2,000-year-old ruins - archaeologists have only uncovered about two-thirds of Pompeii so far and they're discovering new things all the time. For example, recently they uncovered evidence that people returned to live in the ash-encrusted ruins of Pompeii even after the major eruption that buried it.

Pompeii was obviously a city rich in the literal and metaphorical sense. It amazed me that some of the homes still showed signs of the elaborate architecture and painting, and I can only imagine how lavish it looked before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius buried it in ash. One of the reasons the disaster captured the imaginations of so much of Europe was because the city had been well-known as a center of trade and culture.

At the same time, there were plenty of the indignities of ancient life to learn about: the example that stuck out to me was how servants would dump human waste-filled chamberpots in the sloped streets and rely on water and gravity to wash it away; however, the horses and animals would still walk in it. I guess they did what they had to do.

They also had an interesting concept of sex back then, and we visited the ruins of several brothels. The women who worked there were known as "lupa" meaning "prostitute" or "she-wolf" and apparently some of them actually howled like wolves to get clients... There was also a street so known for sex work that it had a mounted sculptue of male genitalia attached to the building. (See, these are the fun facts you miss if you just wander the ruins yourself without any kind of a guide.) I learn something new every day.

The Pompeii Antiquarium is also a must, offering a stunning array of artifacts including casts of perfectly preserved victims and well-preserved items. One of my favorite things I saw in there was a beautiful segment of an elaborately painted wall of one of the wealthier homes with what looked like cave art scratched on top of it. A plaque explained children had scrawled their drawings on top of what was likely a very expensive wall, and it occurred to me that children thousands of years ago weren't too different from children today.

For any lover of history and culture, I would put Pompeii on your bucket list. Given that it's thousands of years old, many of the paths we walked were not accessible so I would keep that in mind when planning a trip. And I think you really need a knowledgeable guide (or at a minimum a bunch of advance reading and studying) to get the most out of it. But if you have the opportunity to go, you won't regret it. That's it until next time, when I write all about Crete in Greece!

Fulfilling a 10-Year Dream in Cinque Terre

Our next stop on our 10-year anniversary cruise after Genoa was La Spezia, a port city in Italy from which you can access many famous sites. Originally, we were planning on visiting the leaning tower of Pisa but decided instead to visit Cinque Terre, a series of five towns in the region of Liguria in the Italian Riviera.

This was the culmination of a 10-year dream of mine, because we wanted to go during our honeymoon cruise but we got a late start and missed the train and then it would've taken too long by the time we got into the city. We had to turn back then, hopeful we'd have another chance to visit someday.

So when we had the opportunity on our anniversary cruise, we knew we had to take it. We just had to choose whether to see Cinque Terre from Genoa or La Spezia, and M figured out La Spezia was significantly closer. There are a few options for transiting Cinque Terre: ferry, train, car, and hike. If it had just been M and me as it was on our honeymoon, we would have opted for as much of the hike as possible.

Instead, since we had S with us, we walked the easiest path between villages (Via dell'Amore between Riomaggiore and Manarola) and otherwise took the train between the towns. Even still, it was extremely hot and tiring to explore in the heat of August, and later on the ship we learned it had broken over 100 degrees Fahrenheit that day! So much for escaping the heat once we were out of Dubai.

We bought a Cinque Terre day pass that included the trains between the Cinque Terre towns and La Spezia without having to reserve specific times. The ticket came with other perks, too, like free use of otherwise paid bathrooms at the train stations. The Via dell'Amore path did cost extra on top of the Cinque Terre ticket, but having done the walk I think it was totally worth it since it was beautiful, mostly shaded, and recently renovated in 2024.

Online, people recommended you only attempt Cinque Terre with good sneakers, and I'm so glad we listened to that advice. All the towns were hilly, even if we didn't do the big hikes.

One mistake I made was bringing sunscreen and leaving it in my bag. I didn't realize until the end of the day that we hadn't put it on, and by then it was too late. I wound up with a dorky tan line, but somehow the fair-skinned M and S were relatively unscathed... They're better than I am about always finding shade wherever we walk, apparently.

Each town had its own charms. Here are some of the highlights:

• Manarola had the best scenic viewpoint, with the perfect snapshot of the town's colored buildings contrasted with the gently rolling ocean.
• We had spectacular gelato at Alberto Gelateria in Corniglia. The Basilico Speciale is a must, with creamy basil ice cream made from basil from their own garden topped with local olive oil.
• We didn't have time to experience them ourselves, but the beach clubs in Monterosso looked amazing. We glimpsed the iconic orange and green striped umbrellas from above.
• Vernazza had great shopping and smaller/calmer swimming areas than Monterosso.
• We just passed through Riomaggiore to start Via dell'Amore, but the town looked fantastic and I would've loved to spend more time there if we hadn't had a deadline.

We really had to rush to cram in all five towns in a single day and make it back to our cruise ship in time, so I can totally see why people stay in Cinque Terre for a week or more. It's one of those places that completely lives up to the hype. The towns were so cute, with colorful buildings lining the vineyard-striped mountains and crystal-clear blue water below. I would definitely come back again. Wouldn't you? That's all for now, until I blog about our next stop, where I visited Pompeii.

Eating Our Way through Genoa

Our 10-year anniversary Mediterranean Cruise stopped in Genoa, Italy following our time in Gibraltar. (Fun fact: did you know it's "Genova" in Italian but "Genoa" in English? I didn't until our trip.) Originally, I planned a complicated itinerary involving lots of train travel around the region, but M talked some sense into me and instead we spent the day exploring the city of Genoa itself as a family.

I tried three of the most famous local dishes: fresh Genovese pesto (which apparently is supposed to be made at room temperature fresh and never cooked but merely added to a dish at the end, oops) with focaccia, pansotti pasta with walnut sauce, and panisse (chickpea flour fritters that look identical to thick-cut potato fries). (I heard farinata, a fried cake of chickpea flour, is actually even more iconic in Genoa but I didn't have room for a heavy, creamy pasta and a full fried flour cake.) We also got gelato (because how can you not when visiting Italy), and it's always phenomenal.

Throughout our trip, S's appetite continued to amaze (especially when we found some of his favorite foods out and about in the wild, like grilled squid in Genoa). He was also a huge fan of panisse. To my surprise, focaccia was not so much his thing. It was nice we had plenty of options without allergens that he could enjoy, and he's getting old enough to understand that's why we sometimes can't share all the food on the table.

Besides eating our way through the city, we walked around without a particularly detailed plan or guide. One of my favorite things to do in an old European city is visit old churches, and Genoa had plenty we could stumble across and explore (as you can see by the dominant theme of this post's photos).

My favorite one we saw was the Cathedral of San Lorenzo, which has a unique striped design on the exterior and interior that sets it apart. (The black and white stripes also made S go, "It looks like Halloween!" - which I'm sure is not what the architects were going for there.) That church was built around 1098; the time scales are mind-boggling and it's amazing to think about when you're standing inside and enjoying such historic buildings and art.

We wrapped up our time in the city with a visit to the local aquarium, partially to get a break from the August heat and partially to do something more fun for S than seeing old buildings. Although we all had a good time, I agree with reviews online saying the tickets were quite expensive and the aquarium was overcrowded despite doing timed tickets only. I personally prefer the value in terms of quality for the aquariums in most other places we've been, but we did get what we needed out of it and learned a few things. My favorite things I discovered were about dolphins, including the fact that some species of dolphins form nursery pods where aunties and sisters help dolphin moms with their babies. Isn't that so sweet?

Eventually we returned to our cruise ship and watched the first part of Moana 2 for the umpteenth time at S's request. (Yes, we are those parents who stretch our normal screen time rules on vacation. We love family movie nights when we travel!) By then, we were grateful just to be back in an air-conditioned room and no longer dripping sweat from our summer stroll. It was a low-key day full of wonderful family quality time, and I was glad we took it easy because the very next day we went on a much more rigorous adventure... Cinque Terre! You can read all about that in my next post, but for now I hope anyone reading this is staying cool.