The trip started last Friday morning, when Kelly, Erin and I took the 9.10 train to Napoli. (Yoya was leaving after her class later that day) We were riding one of the fast trains that would get there in 3 hours, which was nice, except the tickets are twice the price of the normal trains. The train ended up being a 9.45 train, since it was delayed 35 minutes (story of our lives). It was an enjoyable ride, and I wouldn't have minded staying in that comfortable seat with air conditioning for the rest of the day. The train was almost set up like an airplane- it looked that nice on the inside.
When we got to Napoli, he had to take a local train to Sorrento. Upstairs in the train station is where all of the regional train world is, but when you go downstairs to the local train area, it's completely different, and almost kind of scary. Right before I bought my ticket, a man went up to the counter, acting as if he just needed to ask a question, and ended up buying a ticket. Because of the language barrier, all I was able to do was glare at him so hard. On the other side of me was a kid asking for money. As soon as he said a few words (that I didn't understand) I said "no" and walked out of line.
The three of us got on the train to Sorrento, which was nothing at all like the one we had just gotten off of. This train was small, uncomfortable, covered in graffiti, and had no air conditioning. We're used to that kind of situation now, but that didn't make it any more comfortable. The train to sorrento was about an hour and 20 minutes because it stops in every.town.on.the.way.
When we got to Sorrento, we immediately went and found food for lunch. we each got a pizza and ate all of it. They were good, and decently-priced. From there we headed to our hostel, "Hostel Le Sirene", where the girl at the counter said "Allora" way too often. (I still haven't mastered quite when to say this word, and her saying it every sentence didn't help me). We were shown to our room, which had 6 beds, and we spread out and layed down for a while.
When Yoya met up with us about an hour and a half later, we headed to the beach in Sorrento. There is one small strip of sandy beach, which is the free beach, which was also very very crowded. We went a little bit farther and found a private beach with deck chairs and floating chairs. We hung out here for about 3 hours and then went back up to get ready to go to dinner.
We went to a restaurant that Erin went to the two nights she was there the month before, called "Leone Rosso" (I took a picture of the sign and tagged drew in it, of course) We all really enjoyed the dishes that we chose. Erin told the waiter that she had been there the month before and had to bring us back with her, and thanked them for being so nice. So they brought us each a tiramisu FO FREE. that was pretty sweet.
Wandering around Sorrento, I figured there must have been something special going on that weekend- the streets were lined with vendors selling chocolate-covered things and cotton candy. There were cheesy street lights decorating the streets, and a stage set up for performers. I never found out the reason, but it did make walking down the streets more enjoyable. We shopped around for a bit, and ended up in the English Beer Gardens. We were there pretty early, but that meant we had a table when the place became really crowded, which was fun to watch. After that, we called it a night pretty early and headed to bed.
Saturday morning we got up to go to CAPRI! We got our free breakfast in the diner next to the hostel, and went to get on the ferry to get to the island. The ride there was only about 30 minutes. Immediately getting off the ferry, we went and got tickets for a boat tour around the island. This was definitely worth the time and the little money it cost. From that view, we could really see just how beautiful Capri really was. My pictures are nice but cannot really convey what we saw there. About twenty minutes into the ride, we stopped at the Blue Grotto (Grotta Azzura) and were given the option of paying to go on a little boat to go in there. The four of us decided to do that. I got some pretty cool pictures, but I'm pretty sure I never need to do that again. for 11,50 euro, we were inside the grotto for about 4 minutes. that was stupid. The rest of the boat ride was really enjoyable, and I didn't feel like I had been ripped off when it came to that.
Grotta Azzurra
After the boat tour we went and found some lunch, and then started the trip up to Capri Town. According to my guidebook, there are the options of taking an open-air taxi, or the railway up to Capri Town. We did neither of those, and climbed the 450 feet of stairs. The pictures that we took of each other when we reached the top are not quite as flattering as I would have liked, but we can't help that.
We shopped around up there for a while, and then made our way down a different side of the island in search of a beach. We finally found one that was just gorgeous, and isolated from everything else. Their chairs had all been claimed, so we got to go in for less than we would have otherwise. We swam around there for a few hours, and then needed to get back to the Marina Grande in order to catch the ferry back. It was then that we realized how far we had walked and how isolated this beach was- we had to climb up the same 450 feet to get back to Capri town and then back down the way we had gotten there the first time. I was going to sleep well that night.
I guess it was around this time that my stomach started feeling badly, but I decided to ignore it for the most part. We went back to Sorrento and got ready to go out to dinner. When we got back to the Hostel from Capri, we found that there was a man in our room. He was a new roommate, and we had left our stuff in the hostel. We were fortunate that he was nice and that all of our stuff was ok. He was supposed to be in a room with 10 guys originally. That wasn't us.. On our way out we ran into our second new roommate, a woman from China named May.
We went to dinner at Cafe Latino, a place that Kelly and Yoya found the day before and wanted to try. It was a cool place, tucked away in a garden, with a nice atmosphere. It was odd, though, that there was a projector and screen where we were sitting with R&B music videos from the 80s that were really very inappropriate. I don't know why they thought that was a good idea. This place really was in a garden, and we fully understood that when a lemon fell out of a tree and missed Kelly's head by only a few feet. She carried that lemon around with her for the rest of the night.
When we finished dinner, I decided that I didn't want to go out because I wasn't feeling well. Erin was tired, so she and I went back while Kelly and Yoya when out. They didn't end up coming back till 3 or 4, while we went to bed around 10.30. haha
The next morning I realized that I just needed to go home instead of going to Positano. Yoya was going home as well. She, Kelly, and I wanted to hit up Pompeii while we were in the area, so we took that local train in the direction of Napoli and got off in Pompeii. Erin had been there the month before, so she went straight to Positano.
It was so cool to be in Pompeii. I studied it in Latin in high school, and being there was just unreal. I never thought that I would be able to walk through ancient ruins like that, and I was doing it. We had fun taking our time walking around taking pictures. It would have been more fun if we hadn't had to carry our bags around, but that didn't slow us down much.
ancient toilets... :D
We ate lunch just outside the ruins, and then got on our respective trains: Yoya and I to Napoli, and Kelly back to Sorrento, from which she would get a bus to Positano.
This is where the story about the trip should have dwindled down and ended. Unfortunately, this is not so. Yoya and I got to Napoli around 2.00 and tried to use one of the machines to get tickets to Florence. We were going to take the slow train back in order to save money. However, the machine wouldn't work for us, and we got in the real line to buy the tickets. 15 people and 30 minutes later, we were next in line, when a man walks up (again, looking like he's just going to ask a question) and BUYS A DAMN TICKET! If my eyes really burned like they probably looked like they were, he would have had a hole in the back of his head. I'm surprised Yoya didn't go off on him. We finally got up to the counter and bought our cheap tickets to Florence, with a transfer in Rome. The train would leave an hour and a half from then.
unrelated, but you have to pay a euro to go to the bathroom in the train station.
waiting for our train in naples
Of course, the train was late, by 30 minutes. It was one of the Hogwarts Express-like trains, and we had to sit in the fold-out aisle seats for the first 45 minutes or so because the train was so crowded. We took the seats of some people who got off before Rome. When we got to Rome we got off and checked to see when the next train to Florence was leaving. There was one leaving in TWO minutes, so we ran down and hopped on. We found a cabin that had no one in it, but had some luggage. When the owners of the luggage came back, they made us change seats, even though these trains have no assigned seats. About 45 minutes into the ride, we started smelling something unpleasant. Someone suggested that it smelled like smoke, just as the cabin started to get a bit foggy. We got our stuff and moved to a cabin that was closer to the front, where the smell and smoke weren't as bad. Then the train stopped for about 10 minutes. Everyone was out in the aisle, leaning their heads out the doors, trying to figure out what was going on. I think we learned that they thought that something was going on with the brakes. The train started and stopped again about 2 or 3 more times, and then kept going all the way to Florence. I was glad we didn't have to change trains.
Checkin' it out
We got back to Florence around 11.00, and I was starving. I made myself a Caprese salad, called home, and went to bed. There were only 2 other people in the apartment, and I scared them when I came home because they weren't expecting anyone.
The Amalfi coast was gorgeous, and I had a great time. Despite it being more plain in comparison, though, I think I had a better experience in Cinque Terre. It has been my favorite so far.
I'm sorry if this was hard to follow! Writing about such a big trip is intimidating!
Love y'all!
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