|
  | |  |
Chineese - Italian Style
Entry 21 of 22 | show all | print this entry |
Chineese - Italian Style.
Today started very early indeed. At about 5am Fiona's phone rang. It was some guy who lived in Brooklyn (near Footscray) calling to say he'd found a phone and was ringing to see who it belonged too.
I gave him our home number and said to call at a reasonable time - and then relised it was 1pm Melbourne time. The phone of course belonged to Daniel and he must of lost it the night before.
Our alarm then went off at 6am for us to get ready for our trip to Naples. We were extremely efficient and were at the train station by 6:45am giving us about 50 minutes to book seats on the train.
Thanks to the efficiencies of the station ticket sellers it almost wasn't enough time.
The trip to Naples took 2 hours and was uneventful. Fiona had planned a walk for us based on a book she had of "Walking Tours in Italy".
We started of with a quick duck off into a pastry shop. Fiona is insisting I describe her morning tea. It was a deep fried rissole of miniture macaroni noodles held together with a cheesey white sause
with a tomato, meat centre - heavenly. We then started a 2km walk to the beginning of our walk. This included running the gauntlet of street vendors trying to sell
us, belts, bags, purses, laptops, WiFi phones and sunglasses.
The trip took us to the Opera and a castel on the water called Castle Nuovo. We went to the top and it gave great views of the surrounding area. From there we went back past the Napoli copy of the Pantheon.
This is a poor copy and wasn't even open for us to go inside. From here we went to a Funicular station and caught the Funicular (a cable car that goes up steep hills) to the hillside residential area.
Up here we had lunch by a monestary and church which weren't open for us to look at but the views from here were superb. Probably the best part of the day. We walked back to another Funicular station and rode back down.
We continued to follow the walk to various museums and churches but none were open which was quite disappointing. We eventually got to our last point of interest which was a museum with many artifacts from Pompei.
This was something we were both looking forward to and thankfully it was open.
There was many relics and statues there as well as a 1:100 scale of the ruins of Pompei. I had no idea it was so big. It is about 1 square kilometer in area and contained
One very large amphitheatre and one smaller one, a totally enclosed arean simialr to the colosseum, many public squares and baths as well as literally hundreds of private houses.
From here we had another long walk back to the station. Both FIona and I are sick of walking and our feet ache - no more long walks for us for a while.
We went back to the station and did a lap of the vendors trying to buy some last minute trinckets.
Our overwhelming feeling of Napoli is we are glad we decided not to come here for multiple nights as part of our trip. The old part of the city is extremely dirty with piles of rubbish all over the place.
There is graffit on everything showing a distinct lack of civic pride. Most of the churches and museums we visited were closed and we definitely did not feel safe around the vendors at the station.
We spent the whole time walking around holding pur bags in our hands.
The driving here was even more chatotic than in Rome if that is possible. People were rushing around in their cars and on their bikes.
On one accassion I saw an older bloke riding his motorbike the wrong way down a one-way street while talking on his mobile phone.
There was a woman in her high heeled shoes on a scooter going through a roundabout with her handbag over her shoulder while she was tryinf to fix her hair.
Twice we saw kids that couldn't have been more than 14 years old driving on motorbikes through the streets with no helmets.
Basically the place was dirty, noisey, chaotic and we didn't feel safe there. Unless you are specifically going to see Pompei then we wouldn't recommend it.
We ran out of time to execute plan A for dinner which was to buy up from a deli and have a picnic on the train (the Appian Way still lingers strongly in our memory) so we executed plan B.
On our way back to the hotel in Rome we would simply pick somewhere close and have dinner. Of all places this turned out to be a Chineese restaurant.
Now this place probably sat 50 people and was packed and there was a line at the door. It took us about 10 minutes to get a seat and then about another 20 minutes before our order was taken.
The was Chineese - Italian style! On the menu there was ravioli, spaghetti, and other pastas and they gave you a plate of peanuts in the shell to finish off your meal.
We made the mistake of not eating until late which meant we ordered while we were very very hungry. We ate the following......
A bowl of crab and asparagus soup each
Shared a large sesame prawn toast
Shared a large chicken and crab salad
Chicken Arancia - sliced chicken breast cooked in an orange sauce with slices of orange
Gamborini - Prawns cooke in a tomoato and chilli sauce
Beef with mixed vegetables
Steamed rice
Panuts in the shell
It was all very nice - and way too much.
So tomorrow we start our long flight home and arrive Monday evening local time. We expect to be very tired when we get home. The trip has been fantastic and we will add another couple
of entries about the flight home and our general round up of the trip.
It has been great sharing all of our adventures with you and some of you must have enjoyed it because we have had about 600 hits on our blog page - thanks for reading!
Note: No photos the last couple of days as I am having trouble getting an internet connection from the room. But don't worry I will be selling "Mark & Fiona's European Vacation" Photo CDs on our return. Price available on application.
Ciao
Mark and Fiona.
Latest Comments (1)
|
Naples (reply)
May 11, 2008 19:16 EST by orilecj
Hi Guys, just read your last entry with Nadine and she wanted me to comment on your view of Naples. When we travelled there I had the same opinion of Naples as yourselves, however, Nadine says that this vibrancy and colour is what made it one of her favorite cities in Italy. No fakeness for the tourist, it's raw and she fell in love with it. I still agree with you though, it's a good place to pass... show all
|
 Post a new comment |
|
If you like this entry, search for other entries from Italy or try a new search. |
| |
| Table of Contents |
| 21. | Chineese - Italian Style - Rome, Italy May 10, 2008 (  1 ) |
|
|
|
|
Back to Entry - Back to Home
|
Send a message
3 votes 
