I travel light.
I travel cheaply.
I'll sacrifice a meal if that means I can fit another site in and a gelato stand is located.
And if I'm traveling- I'm definitely a go getter. I'm going to climb the towers, check out the churches, visit shops, spend time in a museum...well, you get the point.
Turns out my cousin is very similar with her methodology so when I picked Tink up with one of her friends early on a Saturday morning at Port of Bari telling them our itinerary, she didn't even bat an eye.
Maybe that's because she was being too entertained as I talked back to the GPS to get to our first destination of Alberello as I heard all about their Croatia travels in the week prior. We finally found the part of the town we were looking for, hit up my favorite trullo for some fabulous liquor samples, and explored the church. The trulli neighborhood isn't all that large, so once our arms were full of shopping bags we found a place to grab lunch.
They were healthy.
I wasn't.
They ordered salads.
I ordered fries.
They got a huge bowl of green lettuce.
I got fries.
We then proceeded to cut across to my side of Italy. Our route looked something like this and let Ravi explore a bunch of new roads. I can only say something like that too because whenever I thought I was going the right direction, somehow it turned out being incorrect. Oh well. It's all part of the adventures and the girls got to experience first hand drivers in Southern Italy. We stopped in Positano for a break in driving, a touch of shopping, and gelati. When in doubt, gelato is the correct answer.
After ending up in downtown Naples on a Saturday evening, Ravi kissing the bumper of a car in front of us, and fighting a ton of traffic...we finally made it home to Nico. He was a little wary of the extra two people walking in with me, but a peace offering was given and all was well with the world. From that point on he was a goof and decided he could hang out with us as we enjoyed 4 pizzas prepared for us (by Joe of course) over hearing about the latest neighborhood drama.
A few short hours later, rested, showered, we trekked back out to Ercolano, another community destroyed by Mt. Vesuvio. It was a treat to have someone else telling me about what we were looking at, even if a lot of the Italian was Spanish sounding. Once we explored every nook and cranny within the escacvation site it was time to head back to Naples for the speedy tour around the Old Town.
We may have sat and ate for some time, but so much of the Italian culture is built around the tradition of eating and sharing meals, it seemed appropriate. As far as specific reactions and some of the crazy experiences, well I'm going to let Tink share those with you. Why? Well, at this point I think I'm immune to some of the craziness of Naples so it's more fun to read about a first timer's reaction than mine.
