October 8 (Wednesday) – Our final home base in Italy was Salerno,
a city and comune in Campania and the capital of the province of the same name.
It is located on the Gulf of Salerno on the Tyrrhenian Sea. We had to take two trains
- one from Lucca to Florence and another, a “fast” train from Florence to
Salerno, with speeds of 300 kilometers per hour (187 mph) and stops in Rome and Naples.
Our rooftop apartment was small but offered amazing views of the
sea, mountains and the moon setting over the mountains in the morning.
 |
| View of Salerno and Amalfi Coast from apartment |
Dinner that evening was at the Pizza Club, dining at a small
sidewalk table. Ahhh, this is Italy!
October 9 (Thursday) – We talked to a travel agent about trips to
take outside of Salerno and then walked through the historical area of the
city. Lights were being hung in preparation for a Luminary celebration to be
held in November.
 |
| Luminary festival |
 |
| A tradition: passeggiata, the nightly stroll through the old town |
At the recommendation of the apartment manager, we walked around
the corner to Mama Rosa's (#25 on Trip Advisor) for dinner. This was a family
restaurant and no one spoke English. The menu was all in Italian too. Those
language classes didn’t help much.
Mama Rosa greeted Jamey with a kiss on each cheek. It felt like
they should be related. Mama wanted to serve us everything on the menu. The son
of Mama Rosa seated and waited on us. We let him recommend dishes for us. We
had pasta with mussels, clams and some long narrow shell fish we had never
seen. Delicious! Then Jamey had a plate of fried (no batter) whole shrimp and
calamari rings - very tender. Ken had four huge grilled prawns. Adding a nice
finish to an already scrumptious meal, we shared dessert, a chocolate torte
with whipped cream. All with red wine! Mama Rosa kept pointing to her
Certificate from Trip Advisor and herself and chattering away in Italian.
Kisses again when we left.
 |
| Dinner at Mama Rosa's |
October10 (Friday) - Ken had to go to a TIM (Telecom Italia
Mobile) store to get a new
SIM card for the cellphone. Then we walked to the train station. Protesting
students carrying banners were marching down the middle of the street. We never
found out what they were protesting. We purchased tickets to go to Pompeii
today. Our scheduled train was canceled due to protesters sitting on the tracks
in the Rome area, preventing trains from coming in. Fortunately, we were able
to catch a later train. On arrival, we had to walk a mile or more to get to the
entrance of the historical site. Needless to say, we did a lot of walking in Italy!
Pompeii was larger than we expected. We walked through much of the
ruins which are still being excavated and repaired. There was also a lot we
didn’t get to see – just not enough time.
 |
| Ruins of Pompeii with Mt. Vesuvius in the background |
 |
| Interior of one of Pompeii's buildings |
Dinner was delicious at Il Tagliere. Again, no English spoken here
and the menu was entirely in Italian. Trying to understand explanations from
the waiters of the different menu items was challenging but we finally made
choices, which turned out to be great ones. We were served two different kinds of
bread, bruschetta and thin slices of prosciutto and a bowl of barley potato
soup (all of which we did not expect) before our meals. Many different meats
were served on their antipasto plates and the restaurant had their own
hand-slicing machine out in the middle of the restaurant. We watched a waitress
preparing a tables’ antipasto order, which included meat carved from the head
of a pig. This made for interesting photography. We were contented and full
when we left.
 |
| An interesting experience at Restaurant Il Tagliere! |
October 11 (Saturday) - Stayed at home, rested and did laundry. Our
dryer was Mother Nature. We hung clothes out on the rooftop.
October 13 (Monday) – To get to Vietri Sul Mare, one of the small
villages next to Salerno, we took a bus. When we purchased the ticket we were
told what bus to catch and that the driver would just let us off on the road
and we would have to walk down to the village. We weren’t sure where to get off
and a woman, speaking only Italian, motioned for us to follow her off the bus
and down some steps. Was she a helpful Italian? Where was she taking us? We
kept trying to ask if we were in Vietri Sul Mare. She just kept talking and
motioning for us to follow her. We did until she pointed to another set of
steps leading down to a dark building. We think she was directing us to a
tourist office in there but weren’t sure so we thanked her for her help. Not
knowing where we were, we saw a young girl and asked her if she spoke English.
Happy days, she did and told us we were in Vietri Sul Mare, known for its
ceramics. We popped in and out of the many shops with beautiful ceramic pieces.
We would have loved to have purchased some but kept reminding ourselves we
didn’t have luggage space to carry them back. Note to selves – pack an empty
bag for bringing back souvenirs or take less clothes.
 |
| Vietri Sul Mare |
 |
| One of the many ceramic shops |
Vicolo della Neve, a fantastic restaurant serving traditional foods
in a traditional style, was recommended by the tourist agent we talked to
about sites to see in and around Salerno. Ivano, our waiter, spoke no English
but was wonderful and very animated. The foods - eggplant parmesan, pasta
fagioli, peppers stuffed with anchovies, and other dishes, were in large pans
in a glass case. The diners would choose their meal and the waiters would spoon
out large portions into a pan to be taken to the kitchen and reheated. Baskets
of bread were provided for soaking up sauces and juices.
October 14 (Tuesday) – Another train trip, passing through some
gorgeous countryside, to see the Paestum ruins. The main features were the
standing remains of three major temples dating from the first half of the 6
th
century BC. These were a basilica and temples of Neptune and Ceres. The local
National Museum featured painted tombs from both the Greek and Lucanian
periods. This is the only example of a complete Greek fresco from the era
around 470 BC. Buffalo mozzarella was made here in the traditional manner.
 |
| The Greek ruins of Paestum |
From Paestum we went to Agropoli where nothing was open because we
arrived during siesta time. Shops wouldn’t reopen until 5 p.m. A medieval castle was
perched on top of a hill but we did not go up. After enjoying Italian beers at a seaside bar, we caught the train back to Salerno.
 |
| The sleepy town of Agropoli on the Cilento Coast |
La Botte Pazza, #5 on Trip Advisor, was our choice for dinner. A fantastic dining experience that included the chef describing the evening's menu and free, red or white wine!
 |
| The chef presenting the menu at La Botte Pazza |
October 15 (Wednesday) – We took the ferry to Positano, a small
Amalfi Coast seaside village west of the town of Amalfi that is built on the steep hillside which leads
to the sea. It was a cloudy and overcast day which helped to keep the heat down
as we wandered the steep and scenic streets. There is a church which contains a
black Madonna icon with an interesting, although untrue, legend. As the story
goes, pirates had stolen the Madonna from Byzantium. Their ship was hit by a
storm off the coast of Positano and they heard a voice telling them to leave
the Madonna behind. The icon was dropped off at Positano and the storm abated. Sounds
like a good pirate story for the locals to tell the tourists.
Positano
 |
| Canolli - yummy! |
October 16 (Thursday) – A stay home to rest my weary body day. Got
laundry done and had pizza for lunch and Greek food at Mythos restaurant for dinner. This was our first non-Italian meal.
October 18 (Saturday) – One more Amalfi Coast village to see
before returning home. We took the bus to Amalfi, known as the most scenic
village along the coast. From here, we hopped another bus which wound its way up the very twisty road to the beautiful hill-top
village of Ravello. The views here were breathtaking. No ferry could reach this
village.
Amalfi
 |
| A lunch of mussels and sardines |
October 19 (Sunday) – Sadly, this was the day to pack for our return home.
October 20 (Monday) – Planes, trains, and automobiles. It was time
to start our journey back home. Walk to train station, towing luggage behind;
train to Naples then scary taxi ride (driver was a maniac,
making three lanes out of two, regardless of oncoming traffic) to airport.
First leg
was a flight to Stuttgart, Germany; next flight was a turboprop to Dusseldorf
where we overnighted at a very comfortable, clean and cute inn, Hotel
Destination 21. We took a taxi from the airport to the inn and the inn’s owner
drove us to the airport the next morning in his Mercedes.
After six weeks of eating Italian food, we enjoyed a dinner of schnitzel, french fries, and German beer at Ikaros restaurant.
October 21 (Tuesday) – Compared to the Italian airports,
especially Naples which was very confusing and people were rude, the German
airports and countryside were neat and clean. People were very friendly and
helpful. We boarded our plane for an eleven hour flight to Miami.
The airplane hit bumps often, trying to dodge a hurricane/tropical storm
sweeping up into Europe, bringing wind and rain. Evidently, we had gotten out of Europe just in time since
we had had fantastic weather during our 6 weeks.
Crazy thing was it was still October 21, Tuesday, when we arrived
in Miami. We gained back those six hours we had lost. With the Ebola and Islamic State concerns going
on, it wasn’t easy re-entering the USA. It took over an hour to get through
Customs, get our luggage, and get our rental car. After a four hour drive, we made it home, dropping the
luggage, and quickly going to bed.
Italy was definitely amazing. We were going to miss it but it was
good to be home. Facing the realities would have to wait until tomorrow though.
Remember... "Enjoy life, it's not a dress rehearsal"
