Napoli!

 

Vesuvius behind us

Napoli! An Introduction

My journal of our month-long stay in Campania was mislaid for seven months.  It has only just been unearthed. I’ve been reading through it and enjoy reliving our time there. And I’d like to share it with you.

We spent the month of October in one Italian city: Naples.  This gave Scott a chance to practise his Italian language skills, for which he is very proud (with good reason: he can chat with the taxi drivers!) 

We chose a Neopolitan Airbnb in a neighbourhood recommended by a friend who knows Naples well. We were not disappointed by the area and only slightly by the flat.

Our mild disappointment was that there was no view of the sea nor was there private outdoor space (we had a table and two chairs outside the front door along the pavement, both pedestrian and vehicular). 

It didn’t really matter in the end because the mosquitos came out at dusk and sitting in the nicely air conditioned living room was preferable.

Cool and comfortable flat

The flat was half-way down a descent toward the sea on a small side road off Via Posillipo, the main drag west out of downtown Naples. The walk up and down was quite the exercise. Five hundred fifty steps each way. We made that walk up at least once, often twice a day.  After a week or so we noticed our bodies improved from the exercise.

550 Steps up to Via Posillipo

It is easy to catch a bus right at the top of our street. The first full day, we sat at the little café at the top of our street to watch how often Bus No. 140 came and went.  As it was every 20 minutes or so, this became our go-to means into town. (That little café became our daily haunt throughout our time in Naples. More about it and the wonderful people there in a later post.)

Back to the bus: I spent almost ten years taking the bus to work in London, becoming fatalistic about missing the odd bus to and from the office during those years.  But Scott was often annoyed at my mantra about missing a bus:  “We didn’t miss our bus. That wasn’t our bus because we’re not on it.” 

A little more about where we lived:  Posillipo. It’s an upmarket neighbourhood to the west of Naples proper, but an easy 20 minute bus ride into the heart of the Lungomare (an area where Neapolitans stroll along the waterfront with views of Vesuvius to the east and Capri to the south.)

The immediate area at the top of our street houses pretty much anything you might want or need:  our little café (where they served a delicious prosecco), a green grocer with very good produce, a little deli where they make good sandwiches to order as well as dairy, wine and beer; a fish market, small butcher, pharmacy and a pizza joint that turned out to be pretty awesome. 

Fresh Veg and beautiful women!

(I’m saving the food and drink details for a later post) 

This, we believed, was going to be the start of a beautiful friendship. With Naples.