Finally! Here are some pictures of (and a story or two about) the rest of our trip to Italy that we took way back in October. I hope you enjoy!
You can read about {some of} our adventures in Rome last October
here and
here.
When I was little, I was fascinated by archaeology (thank you, Indiana Jones) and I would pretty much read anything to do with ancient Rome or Greece or Egypt. On a visit to my grandma's house, I discovered
this issue of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC in one of the large stacks the magazine that she always kept stationed around her house. I spent hours pouring over the article and its pictures about Herculaneum, Pompeii and the eruption at Vesuvius that buried them both. I was fascinated and horrified and sad. This wasn't some abandoned cave with broken pottery. This was a city in its prime, unexpectedly buried by a violent, terrifying volcanic eruption. There were
people and families that lived and died there. They had stories. They were there. It was a city. Then it was gone, preserved and forgotten for almost 1700 years. I knew if I ever got the chance, I had to see it.
It was every bit as sad and eerie and horrifying and fascinating as I imagined it would be when I was a little girl.
the ancient Greek settlement of
Paestum
There were mysterious specks in the skies above.
Turns out they were balloons.
We did not take The Babe on this outing.
Volcano caldera on one side + steep cliff on the other + toddler that likes to climb over things
just seemed like a disaster waiting to happen.
The Babe at the
Capua amphitheater where
Spartacus trained as a gladiator and his slave revolt began.
If you've perused all the pics from our Italian adventure you might be asking yourself, "Where are the pictures of the Coliseum?" The simple answer is, there are none. We didn't see it. Say what? Who goes to Rome and doesn't see the Coliseum? It's like going to Paris and not seeing the Eiffel Tower. Turns out, we go to Rome and miss one of the greatest tourist attractions on earth and here's why...
The Babe was sick. We kept hoping that he would get better. That he would start eating. But by the end of the first day we were worried. He had a fever. He was miserable. He was grabbing his ears and screaming a lot and then, almost as a defence, he would fall asleep. Over dinner that night The Boy and I talked about what might be wrong. (Dinner, by the way, was a carb feast if ever there was one because I was gonna be all "When in Rome" and
eat like an Italian. I
thought I was ordering a pasta as one course and some grilled veggies as another course. What I
actually ordered was a big ol' plate of pasta and a big ol' pizza with a smattering of grilled veggies. Total rookie mistake.) We came up with either an ear infection or a throat infection or, God forbid, a combination of the two. I know from bitter experience that neither infection is something you really want to mess around with, so we decided that we would see if our hotel had a doctor on call. If we had to we would take him to the hospital. We quickly finished our meal and headed for the Metro up the street.
As soon as we got down to the platform I knew something was up. It was packed. There was nothing on the information board saying when the next train would arrive. We were there for maybe 5 minutes when there was an announcement and people grumpily started moving toward the exits. The line was down...there would be a replacement bus...blah blah blah. If you know anything about replacement buses then you know how impossible it is to squeeze on to one, especially with a stroller, and these buses were PACKED. We watched with the dejected masses from the metro as bus after jam packed bus passed. We figured the bus would take forever, so we opted to try our luck with a taxi. Nope. They took one look at the stroller and kept on driving. We pulled out our map. It was a straight shot and about a mile from where we were to our hotel (a lot of it up hill). It was getting late and catching a ride was looking increasingly impossible so we decided to walk.
When we arrived at the hotel 45(ish) minutes later we immediately consulted the concierge. Yes, they had a doctor, but he was not a pediatrician and would most likely send us the
Bambino Gesu Children's Hospital. The concierge proudly told us it was THE best children's hospital in Europe before calling us a cab. Ten minutes later we were zooming through the quiet streets of Rome on our way to the emergency room. We were there for two hours before we saw a doctor, and, considering the long waits in emergency rooms in general and the reputation for excruciatingly long waits specifically in Europe, we were pleasantly surprised. She was super nice but spoke very little English. I speak very little Italian - and it's opera Italian to boot - but somehow between the two of us The Babe was taken care of. He had a throat infection, but his ears were fine. She gave us a prescription for some antibiotics and sent us on our way. We didn't have to pay a thing.
We were mentally and physically exhausted when we got back to the hotel. We tried to give The Babe a quick bath, but he was not having it. In the end we took a damp washcloth to him to get most of the grim off, gave him some baby Tylenol, put him to bed, and, after quick showers (we had been walking around Rome all day, after all), The Boy and I hit the hay, too. It was about 2am.
Originally we'd planned to spend Day 2 exploring the Coliseum and Roman Forum before catching a late afternoon train to Naples, but The Babe needed his sleep, it was raining, and I woke up with the WORST migraine EVER. Chalk it up to stress + early pregnancy hormones + dehydration + more carbs in 24 hours than I normally consume in a week, I guess. Obviously we were in no shape to play tourist. Stick a fork in us, we were done in Rome. It was time to head to Naples. I spent the rest of the morning on the bathroom floor while The Boy ran out to get The Babe's prescription filled, took care of us, and tried to get us organised enough to leave.
I felt well enough to make it through the check out process. I was even up to making two new friends (a nice couple from California) and we all decided that we should share a van to the train station. Once that van started moving, though, all bets were off. I spent the entire 20 minute ride willing myself with every fiber of my being not to throw up while my new friend sat across from me in abject terror, directly in the line of fire. All I could do was say, "I'm sorry. I'm not feeling well. " This was clearly an understatement. I looked like death only slightly warmed over. He smiled nervously and said, "That's OK." but you could see in his face that he just wanted out of that van. Who could blame him? They said a quick goodbye and disappeared into the train station as soon as they collected their luggage from the back of the van. We haven't kept in touch.
I spent the train ride with my head against the window, my eyes closed trying to block out the sunlight and the movement from the passing countryside. The Babe spent the train ride trying to climb into my lap while The Boy tried to wrangle him back into his own seat. This made him intensely unhappy. He was sick, too, after all, and needed Mommie cuddles. In the end we let him climb into my lap and we both fell asleep.
The Boy's cousin picked us up at the train station in Naples and took us home where The Babe and I crashed for the rest of the day. The next morning everyone felt better. My migraine was gone. The antibiotics were working their magic on my little sick one. He wasn't 100%, but you could tell from the running and screaming through his new surroundings that he clearly felt 99% better. We decided to try our luck and go to Pompeii. The Babe spent most of his time happily in a baby backpack and even felt well enough to climb down a few times to explore. Our vacation in Naples had begun and the rest of our trip was a blast!
A very big THANK YOU to these two awesome, fun people
for showing us around their part of Southern Italy.
We had the BEST time ... after everyone was well, of course.
