2017.06.25/26 – Ottawa – Rome (Italy)

While we were packing our luggage on the previous Friday evening, Jenny kept on reminding us that we were now retired. We had another retirement celebration on Saturday evening with some very good friends.

On Sunday, our trip started a bit differently as we took the bus to the Montreal airport as opposed to driving our own car. The parking for an extended stay at the airport, contrary to past years, had significantly increased in cost and had become no longer appealing to us. Another kind and dependable friend drove us from home to the bus station.

The bus ride was well appreciated as the driving was a bit treacherous at times with some heavy rain. We arrived at the airport in plenty of time. Our check-in was quite easy as we had completed most of it online the previous evening and we only needed to print our luggage tags at the airport kiosk. We had our meal at St-Hubert before going through the security control.

The flight was as comfortable as it could be with limited irritants. Although the flight was delayed at departure, we managed to arrive 20 mins ahead at Rome’s airport. We opted to take a shuttle bus to the Termini train station instead of the Leornado Express train – at a third of the cost.

After stepping off the bus, we promptly located our hotel a few blocks away. We took a couple of hours of rest before heading out to purchase our train ticket to Naples for the next day. We took the city bus to the Trastevere neighborhood for some great pizza.

Before enjoying a well needed sleep, we booked a 4 night stay at a Bed and Breakfast(B&B) in Naples

2017.06.27 – Rome

At 9:30am, we heard a knock at the door. A breakfast cart was waiting to be rolled into our room. We were asked, upon our arrival the day before, to choose our breakfast items. Sure enough everything selected was on the cart. It was a first for us to have room service on the road!

We visited the ATM before showing up at the Termini train station. Our train ride to Naples took two hours – a full hour more than the new Frecciarossa fast trains.

Naples

The Booking.com reviews had warned us about our selected B&B location as somewhat challenging to find. As we were zeroing in on the location, some ladies came out from behind a barn-like door and inquired whether we were looking for the B&B in question as they had been unsuccessful at finding the place yesterday.

After less than 48 hours in Italy, we were still a bit intimidated of crossing the streets like the locals but we were working on it. We went for some pasta for supper in a nearby neighborhood.

2017.06.28

We opted to get an early start for our visit of the famous archaeological sites of Herculaneum and Pompeii – that were destroyed by the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. After our accommodation’s breakfast, we walked to the nearby train station and bought tickets for the train ride to the Herculaneum archaeological site – somewhat of a lesser known site but much more compact than Pompeii. We were reminded on the train ride how active the pick-pocketers were in Italy around tourist attractions. After less than two train stops, a lady noticed that her purse had been broken in and another gentleman standing near her reported having lost 40€ from his pockets. We spent two hours at Herculaneum and another three hours at the further Pompeii site. By tackling Herculaneum in the morning, we managed to avoid the tourist crowd at Pompeii where we started our visit in the early afternoon. Having visited both archaeological sites, we concured with some travel recommendations suggesting that Herculaneum provided a more concise and manageable experience than Pompeii.

Back in Naples, we decided to visit a very popular pizzeria. We managed to secure some seats after a 20 minutes wait. The place felt like a beehive of pizza workers. The business model seemed simple enough: offer pizza in two sizes and only two different toppings at really low prices.

2017.06.29

Our second day trip from Naples included a visit to the Amalfi Coast – a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We embarked again on the Circumvesuviana train of yesterday that ran between Naples and Sorrento and serviced Herculaneum and Pompeii. Upon arriving in Sorrento, we promptly lined up for a bus ride to Positano – one of a dozen small towns along the Amalfi Coast. The 2.80€ bus ticket provided for a white knuckle ride with a dozen of hairpin turns, each tighter than the previous ones. The descent into Positano provided amazing views of houses and buildings hanging off the cliffs. We had planned to return to Sorrento by water ferry around the coast but we learned unfortunately that the ferries were not running today due to poor navigation conditions. We settled for a light lunch in front of the Tyrrhenian Sea. The returning bus ride was as exciting as the journey in. We enjoyed discovering, for a few hours, the streets and alleys of Sorrento which had a much more upscale feel than Naples. We returned by train to Naples, arriving after 9:30pm.

After booking our 4 night accommodation in Taormina – our first Sicily town on our itinerary, we panicked when we realized that the 9:50am and 1:45pm trains from Naples to Taormina were showing up online as sold out – only the overnight train was showing some availability for this journey. After exploring other transport options such as flights and buses, we realized that the train remained our best option. With some regret, we opted to cut our stay in Naples short and embark on the 9:50am train a day earlier. The two other later trains were also sold-out.

2017.06.30

After a bit of a restless night, Jenny and I got up at 6:00am to check the train availability at the automated kiosks at the nearby train station. The kiosk machine provided the same information as we saw online. So we purchased our 1st class tickets for the 9:50am train later in the morning. After our accommodation’s breakfast, we left for the train station, leaving Naples a day earlier than planned. Jenny was not necessarily disappointed – except for loosing the cost of a night stay.

The 6.5 hour train ride was very comfortable – like most train journeys in Europe. The highlight of this journey came when the train was swallowed slowly by a ferry boat which carried the train in two sections across the water to Sicily. The entrance and exit of the train on the ferry took actually longer than the sea crossing itself to Sicily.

We discovered that Taormina was another town perched on a very high hillside. The Booking.com site suggested that our B&B was only 0.8 km from the train station. Unfortunately, this information was only valid if you were a bird as the actual road distance between the two was more than 4kms. We succumbed to taking a taxi to the B&B in which we had booked in the morning as a single night in order to cover our one day earlier arrival in Taormina.

Wow! We were impressed by Toarmina’s touristy atmosphere. As Lonely Planet puts it: “a chi-chi resort town popular with holidaying high rollers and those wanting a taste off Sicilian dolce vita¨ – not quite the budget traveler’s destination.

Happy Canada Day !