Day 74. 7.6.23.

Paestum to Herculaneum (Ercolano), Naples.

Our friendly parky turned up with a big smile on his face and charged us €5 for stopping in his car park. It was really worth it. We had a lovely night’s sleep.

I’m gonna sound like a whingeing ninny now but, it was so hot this morning with no shade at our parking spot, it didn’t take long for me to get antsy.

After checking on the internet we realised there was no point going to Pompeii as dogs were definitely not allowed entry. It’s far too hot to leave her in the van and frankly, we didn’t want to anyway. So Pompeii will have to wait for us just a bit longer.

---

Instead we headed straight for Ercolano or Herculaneum as it was. We chose a little Sosta close to the site with a very friendly host, who had it on good authority that we could take Meg , she just wouldn’t be allowed into the houses. That works for us.

The sosta was called Agricamping Stone which we are happy to recommend to others.

We arrived about midday and as it was scorchio.

We did the washing and basically hid from the sun until about 4pm. It was still warm but not too hot for Meg and her paws.

She couldn’t have cared less, her sole interest is for catching lizards .

---

The site was a 20 min walk downhill through the town of Ercolano which is festooned with SSC Napoli colours. Gareth said they have just won the Italian league, evident everywhere we looked .

It’s strange really as the archaeological site has a walkway around the top of it, accessed for free. So if you didn’t want to go down and walk around, you get a really good view from the top anyway

We all went down and were awed by the amazing discovery of this lesser known victim of Vesuvius. They actually found more preserved artifacts here than Pompeii due to the heat cloud that descended upon it.

It was lovely to see frescos, mosaics on floors and walls still perfect and walk down the streets of this ancient town. There are also on show skeletons of people who had taken shelter in the boat houses on the beach , over 300 were found.

What is really great about Herculaneum is that you get to walk almost everywhere. There are parts cordoned off for either safety or because work is currently underway.

Seeing how deep the dig goes just shows you how much of the town Vesuvius covered. There is still loads under the new town which they won’t ever get access to. A lot of the artifacts found are now on show in other museums. It would be fab to one day see them returned and on show in their original spots.

When we got back to the van we ordered cheeky pizzas, as you do when in Italy .

By the way, we are camped at the foot of Mount Vesuvius and when the cloud sits on top you get a good idea of what she might look like when angry.

---