There wasn´t that much so see. Everything is dirty in Naples.
We started at the castle half a block from the hostel. It looked quite impressive from the outside. It was 9-30am and already unpleasantly hot. The entrance ran over a bridge across a moat. The moat was empty, except for some small shops. We used our artecard to get in. Good thing too, because I wouldn't have paid actual cash to get in. The inside area was empty, with very little if any interesting archtecture of statues. There were some stone balls on the ground. There were a few churches made of a large room each. Some had remains of cracked old frescos on the walls. We went up a flight of stairs to another big room with new chairs and benches. There had used to be a church with beautiful painted roof many years ago. Now just a plain walled government meeting room.
We left and kept walking. There were some nice large buildings with statues and done up pretty. Then to the most impressive part of Naples, the Chiesa di Gesti Nuovo. It had a huge open area and a thousand columns stretching out to either side of the central basicila.
Now that was something worth seeing. We took some photos until we got bored. The inside of the basicila is likewise quite impressive, with large decorative dome. It was in service so I didn't take any photos.
In front of the columned building was the Palazzo Reale. The building circled around with a open space in the middle. we strolled through, there was no one stopping us or trying to take tickets. There must have been some sort of gallery there. Giant modern pieces of art sat along the outer walls of the Palazzo. These included a 2 faced centaur.
There was also a set of huge black masks and a person riding a fish.
We got bored. We were anxious to get in touch with Gavin and Vannesa. We were supposed to meet up with them some time in Sorrento. We didn't have a place or time to meet. We didn't have phone numbers so we hoped they had gotten our last email. So we started back to the hotel to check our mail in the hope we could still make contact.
At the hotel we got into long skype conversations with Dani and my Perth family. Everyone was at our house for friday night dinner so we got to talk to and see a lot of people at the same time. I really missed seeing them all. Emails don't have that personal touch of a smile or an awkward wave into a webcam. I even got to see the dogs! Everyone looks well.
The Perth family gave us Gavin´s mobile and we texted him. After that we took the bus out front of the hostel to the train station. We bought a Sorrento ticket on the Circumvesuviana, which, turns out, is a completely different company to the other trains. So much so that no one could give us any information about it other than saying ¨no company, that way¨.
We wondered around the station until we found the private terminal for the train. We got to the tracks right as the train had stopped and jumped on board as soon as we could read the word Sorrento on the distant board.
This train was like a regular metro. There were only a few seats and the rest of the crowd were packed into standing cars. I thought oh god, what if its like this for the entire hour to Sorrento. Luckily more people got off at each stop so I eventually found a seat.
There was this strange guy who turned to be from ¨Africa¨ (he wasn´t any more specific). He sat next to josh and asked if he could have our water. A bit off puting. Then he kept trying to make conversation the entire time. But he kept asking strange things. I dug myself into the Italian phrase book, I wasn´t really interested in conversation at that point.
Gavin and Vanessa were to meet us at the station. We hopped off and walked down the stairs to the road but couldn't find them. We looked up to see them waiting on the platform above us. Somehow we had missed each other. There were joyous greetings all around. We had never met Vanessa before, so it was nice to finally do so.
We all made our way down one of the many winding Sorrento streets until we found a café we liked. We were chatted all the while and sat down for a few drinks. We heard all about their travels and they heard all about ours. We told them of all the things that had gone wrong so far and they recounted a few major inconveniences of their own. Things go wrong everywhere I guess.
We found a place for pizza and sat inside to eat. We started with tomato bruschetta. It was so beutifully fresh that we thought of making a meal of just bruschetta. The pizza was nice, but no where as good as that entre.
We walked through the Sorrento streets. There were limoncello shops all about. It must a specialty of the town. They were giving out free testers which were surprisingly strong and vodka like. I wasn´t walking in a straight line after that.
Josh and Vanessa got gelato. Gavin and I ate it with them. Walked back to the train. It was empty for most of the ride, with a few people spaced out over all the carriages. I slept for some of it and awoke to a high moon soon before arriving at the train station.
It was only 10-45, but every door except one was already locked up. Everything must close early in Naples. We walked out of the scary train station to the street. We couldn't find any buses that went to the port area. Taxi were also sparse. So we had to walk.
It wasn´t that far as walks go, but wasn´t a good area. I was anxious for much of the walk, trying not to make eye contact with anyone but pay attention to my surroundings. Getting near our hostel, we walked past a man stashing baby strollers under a bush. I´m pretty sure they didn't belong to him. Was very sure not to make eye contact.
Then the woman in boots and miniskirt in front of us turned around and tried to talk to Josh. Make that the transvestite hooker in boots and miniskirt. I was so glad when we got back to the safety of the hostel. I fell into bed.
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