Conquering Pompeii

After visiting Naples we continued South towards Pompeii, stopping for a very welcome lunch break along the way!

This area of Italy is renowned for its lemons. Tom is very impressed with their size.

Once Tom had finished contemplating his lemons, we began walking through Pompeii. Apparently these yellow flowers are the first plant that begins growing again after a volcano eruption.

The first of two little amphitheatres.

Can you spot Tom performing to a…ahem…packed house?

These were the bases of the steps. Love the little details they put into their architecture.

In the streets of Pompeii they have these stepping stones across the road. Our guide told us they were designed as speed bumps for carts, but a documentary we saw explained that they were designed to help people cross the road, since the roads themselves were used for waste removal.

This is a shop. Those little circular things were used to keep things either hot or cold for sale.

There are very deep gouges in the stone roads from the wheels of carts.

This is a temple. Apparently no-one but the priest (for want of a better word) was allowed to enter it.

Stone images on the walls…

Some of the columns have been reconstructed for the benefit of the tourists, with patches of the original stone attached when available.

The second, much larger amphitheatre which has been reconstructed in part to enable its use now.

Tom never loses an opportunity to pretend to be in Roman times when he’s in an amphitheatre.

This gorgeous little guy was fast asleep. Apparently Pompeii is a bit of a park for stray dogs. They are cared for and fed, and visitors are invited to adopt them. Obviously not really an option for those of us who have to fly 18 hours to get home… pity.

Tom’s still playing gladiator.

This is one of the very well preserved streets.

This is a gorgeous fresco on a wall. Still amazingly recognisable.

Apparently the Pompeiians enjoyed a slightly more liberal attitude when it came to certain things. This is a brothel. In the main corridor of the building are some very explicit little frescoes that are apparently act a little like a menu. In the interests of keeping things family friendly I won’t show you pictures. Sorry!

Just around the corner, a fountain.

Once again, Tom is overjoyed at the prospect of free water.

Here’s a beautiful mosaic floor.

The thing that surprised us about Pompeii was its sheer size. It has streets upon streets upon streets of incredibly well preserved roads and houses and shops.

One of the most graphic images was this. A plaster cast of one of the victims of the eruption. When some people were hit by lava, they were vaporised almost immediately, but not before the lava around them cooled and set a little, leaving a little air pocket where the body had been. Archaeologists were later able to pour plaster into these pockets and thus create these models.

This is the beautiful mosaic floor in the bathhouse. I was surprised by it, but us tourists were able to walk all over it.

The statues lining the walls of one of the rooms of the bath house.

Tom thought they needed a little help holding up the walls.

The beautiful ceiling.

They deliberately had quite deep wall cavities to help create a sort of central heating system for the sauna room.

This is yet another beautiful mosaic floor in a house. There are words in tiles beneath the dog’s feet which say “Beware The Dog” in Italian.

Here is another stray dog, gazing pensively into the distance.

Until I disturbed its peace by going to chat with it.

This is the bakery. You can see the oven in the rear.

Another beautifully preserved road.

And then I found this little guy again. So cute!

My presence bored him.

He followed us around for a little while, plonking himself down on the grass while our tour guide talked.

Before abandoning us in favour of a bit of rubbish bin digging.

It seems awful to follow those pictures with this, but Pompeii has clearly always loved dogs. Here is a similar plaster cast of a dog’s body made in a similar way to the previous body.

And another human.

This is the body of a girl, who was apparently pregnant. You can see the shape of her belly below her.

Tom thought this was a lovely statue of a girl. Dancing maybe?

But then we realised that it’s a man. A very pretty man.

So there we had officially conquered Pompeii.

We celebrated with a mint chocolate flavoured gelato.

No rest for the wicked, though! After Naples and then Pompeii we were driving on to Sorrento.