Rambling About Europe: Pompeii

After our authentic pizza experience, the McBrides and I prepared to board the “circumvesuviana” train. The circumvesuviana is a no-fluff, stop-and-go, hour-long train ride that curves along the coast from Naples to one of the first towns on the Amalfi coast, and its reputation precedes it.

Almost every time that I read the word “circumvesuviana” on the internet or in any sort of guide book, a wealth of warnings followed. Apparently, the train has one of the highest incidences of pick-pocketing in all of Europe. Every once in a while, as the train hugs the coast, it chugs along before a breath-taking view, and a handful of distracted tourists find themselves a little poorer. So the three of us were on high alert for our next train ride.

We weren’t in any kind of rush, and we recently discovered that the route of the circumvesuviana goes around Mt. Vesuvius – i.e., straight through Pompeii, so we decided to stop for a few hours and visit that famous city on the way.

The trains and stations of the circumvesuviana were covered in graffiti, and it was clear that the idea of painting over it periodically had long been abandoned. We aggressively people-watched as we rode the hot and sticky train, and I am pretty sure that we spotted a few team operations that were prowling for distracted tourists. But we ultimately made it to Pompeii without any trouble. When we bought tickets to check out the ruins, the site gladly checked our bags, and we set off walking through dusty Pompeii.

As you probably know, Pompeii is famous for being in Mount Vesuvius’s path when the volcano catastrophically erupted in 79 AD. Apparently, up until that time, the Roman residents had no idea that the nearby mountain was a volcano. Unfortunately, they found out rather quickly, and the entire civilization was buried in ash and other volcanic debris.

Most interestingly, the volcanic layers preserved the Roman city underground very well. Archaeologists found Pompeii much more intact than other excavated Roman towns. (I’m not sure why this is true or how this all works, but I think it has something to do with “science.”) So today, you can go to Pompeii, learn about the eruption of Vesuvius, and walk the streets of an ancient Roman town.

So Reed, Jen, and I walked around the site for a couple of hours. In many ways, it’s similar to the ruins of the Roman forum near the Coliseum in Rome, but everything stands a little taller and better preserved. The roads are still paved, and many walls still stand almost at their original height. It’s definitely a fun experience to meander down the streets in ancient Rome.

You’ll also see interesting molds like the ones pictured above and below here. Despite what you may have heard, these are technically not petrified volcano victims, but they do give you a good idea of what they would look like. About 2,000 Pompeiians were buried by the volcano, and as their bodies slowly eroded away underground, they left little air pockets in the rocks. When archaeologists stumbled across these cavities, they filled them with plaster and let it dry. When they then uncovered the plaster, they could see the shapes and final body positions of the victims in the little statues that they so cleverly had created. It’s a little morbid and definitely sad, but it was also fascinating.

I’m glad that we took a few hours to stop at Pompeii. I was a little disappointed that I’d be touring Italy without seeing it, so I was happy that we could fit it in. And though it was very interesting, it wasn’t incredibly different than some of what I had seen in Rome, so I am glad that we were able to squeeze it in as a train stop rather than devoting a whole trip to Pompeii. If you’re passing by, it’s definitely worth seeing.

And pass by we did. After we were absolutely covered in dust from walking the streets of Pompeii, the three of us re-boarded the pick-pocket train and continued on our way to Positano.