The first paragraph from Kel & Sian Go Blog:

“I first knew Sian was the friend for me around ten years ago. We worked together and one of our colleagues had just come back from Italy and thought I would love it, more specifically he thought I would love Pompeii. Sian was the next person to wander through my office door and, having spent a little time together out of work, I decided to just ask. ‘We’re both off next Thursday, how do you fancy a day trip to Pompeii?’ her reply sealed her fate, I will be in her life forever! She smiled and said ‘I’ll go and get my card’. Within the next 15 minutes we had our trip booked and paid for.”

This is how we ended up in Naples Airport at the crack of dawn. We had left mine at midnight, driven down to London for an early morning flight and now stood in Naples airport having had very little sleep, fueled completely by excitement.

For those who aren’t sure what Pompeii is you can follow the link to learn more but basically it is a town in Italy that sits in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius. Vesuvius is an active volcano which erupted nearly 2000 years ago burying Pompeii (and much more) almost instantly in hot ash.

It was rediscovered in 1592 and has slowly been revealed to the world in a remarkable state of preservation.

A preserved fresco on a villa wall in Pompeii

Once we had some food we were off to the bus stop, buses ran directly from the airport to Pompeii making it very easy. We did realise whilst booking though that we wouldn’t make it back to the airport in time for the last flight so we did have to book an airbnb for the one night.

The first thing that struck us was the size of the place, you almost get it into your head that, as it’s a tourist attraction, its going to be the size of a theme park or something. But it is a town, for full sized humans and had a population of between 10,000 and 20,000 people!

One of the many MANY streets in Pompeii

It was such a hot day and it wasn’t long before we were hungry again, luckily in the centre of the town was a pizzeria. It was a very surreal moment when we sat in the middle of Pompeii, Italy eating pizza, we had only booked it the week before after all.

After that we headed to the galleries which is a very sombre place.

When the ash fell it fell quickly, there wasn’t enough time for an evacuation, hundreds of people and animals were killed. As the ash solidified over their bodies it created a solid mold and as they decayed over the years these cavities remained perfectly inline with the original body.

As it has been nearly 2000 years there are no physical remains left but what the archaeologists have done is pour plaster into these cavities creating a statue of the original person in their last moments. Some of them are heart breaking and they are not all human.

The statue of person curled up and appearing to either suck their thumb or at least cover their mouth to protect from the ash.

After this we decided to head back to our room for the night. We jumped on the metro and headed back into Naples. I have to admit the difference between Italy and England were a little overwhelming. Three lanes drawn on the road but four lanes of traffic driving, homeless people lying across the street and being given bottled water as opposed to huddled in a doorway trying to be invisible, run down buildings and dented cars everywhere.

Very different but in some ways better, not the traffic thing though that was scary but the people were very friendly. It was just a reminder that Naples is a working city and, like every other, it has many faces.

Our host at the Airbnb was lovely even though she spoke no English, she really made an effort to engage with us and we did manage to have a few very amusing converstaions with her using charades. We were a little worried when we got into the room and saw the size of the steel shutter that we had to pull down over the window but we both managed to get a good nights sleep after a very long day!

Statue on a building in Pompeii

We were up at the crack of dawn for our flight home and actually arrived at our physical homes within 36 hours of leaving. I did by a souvenir book in the airport and was very proud of myself for carrying out the whole transaction in Italian, I was a little dissapointed when the assistant said ‘thank you’ though. I asked Sian how she knew I was English at which point Sian pointed out that we had been in the shop for 20 mins speaking to each other in English. I still think she could have played the game though 🙂

Still, this was easily one of the best last minute, you only live once kinda trips yet!

Lots of Love Kel xx