July 2nd

This morning we packed up and headed to Naples. Somehow, we timed everything exactly right and walked right onto every bus, metro and train just in time without waiting. We got to our hostel without any catches and it is a really nice place! The building used to be a textile mill (hence the name, Fabric) and it's been done in a modern style. It was about 2:00 when we arrived, and after reading that our hostel was only a 15 minute walk from Herculaneum, we decided to not waste the day. We walked down to Herculaneum and WOW it was awesome! The city was built right on the seashore and the volcano eruption destroyed it by lava flow rather than ash, so the buildings are more intact and have ceilings with a lot of cool frescoes and things. We had a great time exploring everything and the guide book was really helpful. There weren't a lot of people so the visit was really nice. Unfortunately, we didn't get lunch at all and by the end we were completely out of energy and I wasn't feeling very well at all. We found a restaurant right outside of the entrance and had a big dinner. We walked back to the hostel and were hanging out typing blogs and looking up ferries to Greece when we got into a conversation with some other people hanging out in the common room. There is a pretty large group of college students who are studying abroad in a little Italian town through an exchange program with four smaller universities in Georgia (USA). We all bonded pretty fast and had a great time talking and playing Yahtzee. Another couple came over and they were from Texas and we all became quick friends. The GA group was heading to Herculaneum early in the morning and were going to stop by the hostel at 10 to get some of their group not getting up early for Herculaneum and then head to Pompeii, so we made plans to meet up and all go together.

July 3rd

I woke up earlier than Ryan and headed downstairs for breakfast and Ward and Taryn (the couple from Texas) had breakfast with me, along with Christopher from Mexico who they'd met earlier. Taryn had seen a lot of the GA group up early around 7, and around 10 we figured they all got up early and headed on to Pompeii from Herculaneum, so we formed a little group and headed to Pompeii. It was really fun to explore the city with new friends and we all had a lot of fun. Pompeii is really big and took a while to get through. We did get to see some dead bodies and the erotic paintings in the brothel. We all headed back to the station, and since the bus to Vesuvius had already ended for the day, we went toward the hostel and Christopher went to Herculaneum. <!-- @page { margin: 0.79in } P { margin-bottom: 0.08in } -->After some great showers, we were back in the hostel relaxing and enjoying dinner and some drinks when all the crew from last night got together and we had a great celebration of fourth of July.

July 4th

We drank way too much during our awesome celebrating, mostly because the bartender felt bad that he couldn't make me any of the 5 or 6 drinks I asked for because he didn't have the ingredients, so he gave me a free very strong drink and then was passing out free champagne and wine so all of us girls could pose for pictures for the hostel. HAHAHAHA. So I felt pretty bad this morning... but we got up and at 10 were headed out with Teryn, Ward and Christopher to Mt. Vesuvius! The big bus we had to ride to it went all crazy winding up the mountainside and it made me carsick on top of already not feeling too good, so by the time we started climbing the volcano in the midday sun with no shade, it was pretty awful. Anyway, we got to the top and it was pretty cool. Ward and I chased the lizards around and Christopher made some really good lizard faces. The path was easy to climb and of course it was all volcanic rock pebbles. I brought quite a few rocks home :) On the way back to the hostel, Ward and Teryn went to Herculaneum and Christopher left when we got to the hostel. Lucky for me, I hadn't eaten lunch and at 3:30pm on a Sunday in a tiny little town, NOTHING IS OPEN, so we slept until 8pm when then hostel chef started cooking, then ate dinner. I didn't feel good at ALL. We relaxed and watched Mr. and Mrs. Smith on DVD (in English - YAY) while we booked our hotel in Rome and flight to Athens.