Tour of the South of Italy
We managed to go on a trip to Southern Italy only the third time: in one year the group did not get enough and had to replace the tour with another, the second time again the same story - the money was returned.
We went from "Natalie-Tours", there were few people again, 11 people, but the tour was not canceled, we went in a minibus. The guide was Yaroslava Gruzinskaya, a very pleasant and beautiful lady who lives in Italy and told us a lot about local customs on the way.
Now in detail: the beginning of the tour turned out to be unsuccessful, because for a long time they could not fly out of Moscow due to a breakdown in the plane, they spent the whole evening and night at Vnukovo. They arrived in Naples only in the morning, settled in the hotel "Gurien" near the square. Garibaldi and the station. At first, Negro merchants strained right on the sidewalks, but there was no aggression on their part and we got used to it.
Day one:
After checking in, we were offered an additional excursion to Capri, costing 80 euros per person, including a guide, ferry and bus to the port. In principle, it was possible to leave on your own, because. ferries run frequently, prices depend on the speed and class of the ferry, We had a high-speed one, sailed for 1 hour, the cost of a round-trip is 43 euros, the slowest goes 1-30, the cost is 35 euros. Upon arrival in Capri, we bought a ticket for a boat around the island - 18 euros. Swim for about 1 hour. I advise everyone such a trip, because. this beauty is indescribable! I have never seen such a beautiful color of the sea. Then we took the bus along the steepest serpentine up to the town of Anacapri, walked there and climbed the cable car (10 euros round trip) to the very top, from where amazing views. After a sleepless night, I was so tired that I fell asleep several times on the way down the cable car.
We took a walk downstairs, went to a small church of Michael the Archangel (2 euros), with a floor covered with tiles depicting biblical scenes. You can’t walk on the floor, they examined from the choirs. Not Siena Cathedral with amazing floors, of course, but nothing. then we examined the outside of Krupp's villa, Gorky's house, Lenin's stele and drove to the port. There was still an hour before sailing and we swam, because. the temperature was under 30. We returned to the hotel already at 9 o'clock in the evening.
Day two:
In the morning we took a tablet with a downloaded guidebook, a map and went to old Naples along the three main streets of the so-called. "Decumans", entering the temples, which are free in Naples. in the temples there is a riot of baroque: gold, paintings, jewelry. In addition, it was hot outside - 32 degrees. The main goal was the Chapel of San Severo (6 euros) with sculptures of amazingly precise work ("Christ under the Shroud", "Chastity" and "Getting Rid of the Spell" with a net carved by the sculptor inexplicably. In the chapel there are still many statues of relatives of Prince San Severo, who created a chapel, many of the figures are allegorical, it’s bad that the ministers not only forbid taking photos, but also don’t allow you to use a tablet - only an audio guide (there is no Russian language), you had to go to the entrance to the crypt and read there. In the crypt there are two mummies, a woman and a man with It is not clear to anyone how this was done 400 years ago, although the prince was fond of various chemical things and was known as an alchemist.
From other churches, I will mention the Church of St. Clara. the main thing there is a courtyard with beautiful majolica tiles-paintings. The entrance fee to the courtyard is quite high - 6 euros.
We liked Naples, we did not pay much attention to the garbage about which many wrote. Stations always have garbage, and the streets are more or less clean. In Naples, indeed, the most delicious pizza, there are pizzerias in which there are long queues. They also sell delicious rum baba (Baba in Neapolitan) and coffee with nuts.
After lunch, we decided to go to Pompeii ourselves. From the station, from a separate platform, the Circovesuviano train goes towards Sorrentro. Ride an hour, price one way 2-50. The train is narrow, with two seats on each side of the aisle. It takes two minutes to walk from the station to the excavations, the entrance ticket costs 13 euros, with a card -15. Pompeii turned out to be a big city, it’s impossible to get around the whole place, especially in the heat and on the rest of the pavement. We wandered for almost 3 hours. There is simply nowhere else in the world like this. Then we arrived in Naples, stocked up at the Konad store on the station square with excellent local wine and celebrated the trip.
Third day:
In the morning we left Naples for the Basilicata region, the city of Matera. there is an amazing old Sassi area - these are houses carved into the rock, you walk right on the roofs. Many historical films were filmed there, in particular Gibson's The Passion of the Christ. The local guide said that in the 70s this area was declared emergency, people were resettled, but then it was recognized as a UNESCO cultural heritage and now people live there again and even hotels are organized. In the city itself, the cathedral of the 13th century is interesting.
Further our path lay in the Apulian "white city" Ostuni, so named because of the white houses. The town is small, pretty, there are beautiful temples, the most famous is the Cathedral of Assunta, 15th century.
By evening, we were brought to a good four-star hotel in the middle of the hills, with a swimming pool, the main inconvenience of which is the remoteness from the nearest settlements, as one tourist aptly put it - "zhopkin's house". Those. Getting out of there on your own is quite problematic and costly.
Fourth day:
Since the hotel is far from communications, independent travel was swept aside, I had to buy an excursion for 80 euros Lecce-Alberobello. In Lecce, at the very heel of Italy, we have long dreamed of going to see the film "Idle Shots", where the action takes place there. It is not for nothing that the ancient city is called the "South Florence" and the "Golden City". The houses there are made of lecchisa stone, which has acquired a golden color over time. The city is a real baroque feast, each temple and just a house can be viewed for a long time. In Lecce we had a wonderful guide Olga Spesivtseva, a real connoisseur. It is difficult to tell about all the beauty in a short review. In addition, Lecce has a whole culture of papier-mâ ché figures, a lot of interesting works on the streets and in shops. They also bake delicious Rustico pies stuffed with mozzarella and tomato paste.
After lunch we went to Alberobello, the city of the famous trulli - cone-shaped buildings resembling the houses of gnomes or hobbits. The local guide told us that in the Middle Ages, in order not to pay tax on the house, the locals came up with such a shape of the house, like - this is not a house, but a shed, the stones were tightly laid on top of each other without a cement bond and the house was disassembled quite quickly. trulli were often encountered along the way, but in the city entire areas are occupied by trulli, residents still live in them, and there are many all sorts of shops. Pretty interesting place
Day five:
We left our hotel and went to Bari in the morning, the guide was Olga again, which made us very happy. On this day, an Orthodox prayer service was held over the relics of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, so there were a lot of people in the crypt, a long line, everyone wanted to venerate the slab, under which the relics of the saint are located (one bone was brought to worship in Moscow).
In Bari, I liked the old city, it's like old Odessa, small courtyards, people sit on the street, etc. Due to the fact that we spent a lot of time in the cathedral, it was not particularly possible to see the new city, our path lay back to Naples.
On the way, the group stopped at a restaurant near the beach, my wife and I did not have lunch, because we had sandwiches, fruit and wine in stock, and went to the beach. The water was clean and we swam for two hours, then our group also pulled up. Then, in the evening, we again arrived at our hotel in Naples.
Sixth day:
In the morning, our program included a visit to Sorrento, as an additional excursion, a trip along the Amalfi Coast for 35 euros was offered. We decided to go, although it turned out to be an unsuccessful decision: they would have brought us to Sorrento anyway (it would take 1.5 hours). There is nothing remarkable in Sorrento itself, we were taken to different shops, not knowing what to do. Then we drove along the coast, making stops for photos in different places, we didn’t stop by Positano. The road is beautiful, of course. Then we stopped to look at something like the "blue grotto" (5 euros), a small cave in the rock with unreal blue water. Then the group was again taken to lunch, it all took a lot of time and we arrived in Amalfi already at 16-00, looked at the Cathedral of St. Andrew the First-Called, and at 18-00 we set the departure time. We decided to go up to Ravello, to see the famous views, but it was not easy to get there, the bus (2 euros) runs every half an hour, it took 30 minutes to climb some unthinkable serpentine, besides, it periodically missed oncoming traffic, because. expensive rather narrow. When we went upstairs, we realized that we didn’t have time at all, hastily clicking on the observation deck, we immediately gathered in the opposite direction, and then the guide called us and said that a costume parade was starting in Amalfi and all buses and cars were being driven out of the city . Our bus also reached halfway and got stuck in a traffic jam, everyone got off and we spanked three kilometers down to Amalfi. There, too, regular buses to Sorrento did not go until the parade ended, our shuttle bus left without us and we got further on our own: by bus to Sorrento, then by train to Naples.
Sixth day:
We had a late flight and we also walked around Naples, although the weather turned bad and it started to rain, but after the heat it was even good. We again walked around the city, visited the Cathedral of St. Januarius (familiar to us from the famous Italian comedy), looked at the New Castle, the royal palace, Plebescite Square, the embankment, etc. Then we went out to the shopping street of Toledo, bought something for our house and drove to the hotel along the futuristic subway line, going out to look at the interiors of the stations. The road to Moscow was uneventful.
That's the whole short story. Conclusion: I would like to go to Naples for another week, there is a lot to see in the city: the Archaeological Museum, the Capodimonte Art Gallery, and castles. Go to Caserta, Salerno. In Naples, a convenient and profitable museum card, there is one for the Campania region, one for the city.
Capri. "Krupp Trail"
Capri
Naples. Chapel of San Severo. "Getting rid of the spell" (Photo not mine)
Naples. Chapel of San Severo. "Chastity" (photo not mine)
Naples. Chapel of San Severo. "Christ under the Shroud" (photo not mine)
Capri. Boat trip
Capri. Turquoise Sea
Capri. Turquoise Sea
Capri. Church of St. Michael
Capri. On the top of the mountain. Everyone has this photo
Capri. Here I would like to swim in a boat
Naples. Via Tribunale
Naples. We were afraid to enter such lanes
Naples. Courtyard of St. Clare's Church
Naples. Chiesa Nuovo
Naples
Naples. Church of St. Anne
Pompeii
Pompeii
Pompeii. Poet's house. On the floor is the inscription "Angry dog"
Pompeii. Stadium
Pompeii. Water fountains
Matera
Matera
Matera. Cathedral
Ostuni
Ostuni
Golden City of Lecce
Lecce
Lecce. Cathedral
Lecce. Cathedral
Lecce
Lecce. Roman amphitheater
Alberobello
Alberobello
Old Bari. What a girl!
Old Bari
Bari. Cathedral of Saint Nicholas. Service, relics of a saint
Amalfi Coast
Sorrento
Positano
Blue water grotto
Amalfi. Cathedral of St. Andrew
Amalfi. Cathedral of St. Andrew
Amalfi. Cathedral of St. Andrew
Amalfi. Cathedral of St. Andrew. Relics of a saint
Ravello
Naples. Cathedral of St. Januarius
Naples. Cathedral of St. Januarius
Naples
Naples. Temple of Gregory of Armenia
Naples. New Castle
Naples. Royal Palace. Horses of Klodt
Naples. Plebescite Square
Naples
Naples
