We Arrive in Naples
Yesterday we arrived in Naples and met our new landlord, Giancarlo. This AirBnB experience has been awesome and we are meeting some of the nicest and most helpful hosts you can imagine. Giancarlo coordinated a taxi to pick us up at the airport and met us at the apartment when we arrived. He spent over 30 minutes showing us around, providing us with insights about his city, where to go, what to see, where to eat and so much more. We are only here for three days and Monday we head to Pompeii, so not much to really do in Naples.
Ilise has been spending a lot of time trying to find great options for us to see the cities we are visiting. She came across these free city tours that work 100% on tips. We joined our first tour here yesterday and spent 2.5 hours with Rafael who took the 4 of us and another 15 or so tourists around Naples. We hit a number of the main areas, starting at the NuevoCastle, which is just a 3 minute walk from the apartment we are staying in. We enjoyed the tour immensely and gave Rafael 50 Euro for his time. There were numerous people that only gave one or two euros, which to me is just insane, there we some who didn’t give anything. I guess that is how the world works.
Before the tour we stopped at a local restaurant that Giancarlo had suggested and the kids shared a pizza and pasta. When in Naples, …., you get the idea. After the tour we headed straight for the gelato place that Rafael had suggested. We all enjoyed ourselves and started walking back to the apartment to have a simple dinner. We stopped at a grocery store and picked up some food that we could eat at home and made it an early night.
This morning I awoke around 6:30 AM and decided to go for a long walk along the promenade in front of our apartment. Giancarlo told me that the walk goes for a number of kilometers and he was right. I walked along the water for over an hour before turning around and heading back. It was 2 1/2 hours before I returned to the apartment to find everyone still sleeping. We didn’t have much on the agenda today other than getting to the castle on top of the hill and I wanted to get some gluten free pizza. I’m allergic to gluten, but I might be making an exception on this trip as there are too many great food options that I don’t want to miss š
Drew decided to stay home and work on her geometry today, so Ilise, Noah and I found ourselves at lunch in the main part of the old city. Noah tried some Pizza Frita, which is a fried pizza. He loved it and ate the entire thing! Ilise and I decided to go to Sobella, a pizza place that Rafael had suggested the day before because they make gluten free pizza. I really enjoyed the gluten free pizza, but I would have enjoyed the regular one more! We then started walking, got some more gelato (at least Ilise and Noah did) and headed for the Feniculare (the tram up the mountain) so we could get to the castle. We found the tram, walked around the castle taking amazing pictures of Naples and then headed back to the apartment.
Overall, Naples is nice but the real reason we are here is to go to Pompeii tomorrow. After Pompeii we head to Rome on Tuesday to spend 4 days roaming around one of the most famous cities in the world. Looking forward to the Vatican, the Coliseum and enjoying some more good Italian food and wine!
To a life well lived….
Larry Kesslin 