Naples 12th September 2010

We took the train from Florence to Rome and then changed to the train to Naples.  We spoke to two Australian couples who were travelling together.  They asked if we could swap seats with them so they could sit around the table and play cards.  That was fine with us, and we moved to a two seat bench across the aisle.  This started a conversation when we heard each other’s Australian accents.  We were amazed to find out that these people knew Pop’s sister and brother in law.  It was lovely to hear about their trip and talk about ours.

It was after 2pm by the time we arrived in Naples.  We needed to get a taxi to our hotel so we got into the queue.  Naples is crazy!!!  The people yell, the traffic just seems to make up the rules as they push their way through, honking horns.  One Italian woman was so furious because she thought the taxi queue starting point had changed, as she saw it, and she was now in the middle of the queue instead of next to go.  She was screaming abuse at every one.  Finally one taxi driver called her and her husband (a small hunched over man who was trying to disappear) over and he started putting their cases into his taxi boot.  She was still yelling and cursing at him so much that he grabbed their bags out of the boot and tossed them onto the road.  You could imagine how this ignited even more yelling and chaos.  Taxis were having trouble moving anywhere.  The drivers started just picking up any one close to them, that is how we got into a taxi and were soon whisked away to the yelling and cursing directed at us this time.  Welcome to Naples!! 

After a nightmare trip through the traffic we were relieved to arrive at our hotel.  The hotel is 30 storeys high and we are on the 28^th   with a fabulous view.  We went for a walk to get some late lunch. We enjoyed the best pizza we had had since arriving in Italy.  We walked on towards the port, and then on towards Santa Lucia.  Fabulous views across the bay.  We walked back to the hotel past a huge square and an arts building.

We were so tired after our long walk we just had our dinner at the hotel restaurant and had an early night.