Napoli
We left Rome yesterday morning and took a high speed train to Naples. The train topped out at 300 km/h (that’s 185 mph in American units) and it took us only a hour to get to Naples! Driving would have taken at least 4 hours. Upon arriving, the difference between Rome and Naples was immediately apparent to me. Naples has a more gritty, dirty feel to it – but not necessarily unsafe. Graffiti is absolutely everywhere. It was raining when we got to Napoli Centrale, so we put on our rain jackets and set off to find our hotel. We had to hop onto a quick metro ride, and then walk uphill a bit. The hotel is actually pretty well hidden! Behind this door is an entire courtyard and a bunch of different apartments, the hotel, and what we think are probably offices of some sort. Luckily someone was coming out of the door just as we arrived, so we didn’t have to figure out how to get inside without being able to call anybody.
We quickly settled in, and tried to decide what we wanted to spend our afternoon doing. First off – food! We were recommended the restaurant Starita for good Neapolitan pizza! And delicious it sure was. We also tried their rice arancino and a baby fried pizza. Yum!!
Rice arancino on the left, fried pizza on the right 
Our pizzas!
Our hotel is literally right by the National Archaeological Museum so we decided to go check that out. It was a neat way to spend a couple hours.
That was about it for our first day in Naples. We headed back to the hotel to rest and try to figure out a game plan for the next few days.
Today, we decided to go check out the Veiled Christ statue at the Museo Cappella Sansevero, and that was beautiful. Photography wasn’t allowed inside, so this postcard is the best I can do, beyond googling an image 😜
After finishing up at that place, we were near the “Christmas Alley” on San Gregorio Armeno. This road is pedestrian only, and there are tons of little shops selling various pieces of artwork and nativity scenes. They were pretty unique! Unfortunately I didn’t grab any photos because it was just so packed with people and I was concentrating more on moving through and not stepping on anyone’s toes. We ended up doing a couple of underground tours of old Napoli! These were very cool. First, we went to Napoli Sotterranea and they took us through some old tunnels and cisterns.
We stopped off at a Tex-Mex place for lunch, because I could absolutely not do Italian for one more meal. I need variety! After lunch, we saw that we were near the Toledo metro station and decided to check it out because it’s advertised as one of the “most beautiful” metro stations! It has a bunch of art inside, and I especially liked this bit.
We walked over to another underground tour, called Galleria Borbonica (Bourbon Tunnel) and I found this one overall more interesting because there was more stuff to look at and it had a varied history! It originally existed as a private tunnel connecting the Royal Palace to military barracks commissioned by a king back in the 1800s, then it became an air-raid/bomb shelter during the Second World War and even living quarters for some. Today it serves as a museum!
Us at the entrance 
An old bike and part of a statue! 
This underground area became a storage area for decades of debris 
I was amazed at how high some of the ceilings were 
A bunch of broken down, ruined cars down here! 
Some people left cooking equipment down here 
These are rotted bed frames from WWII when people would stay down here when Naples was being bombed 
WWII remnants 
More cars 
Vespas! Sometimes the police would confiscate these and dump them underground
After wrapping up the tour, we decided to walk by the Ovo Castle (Egg Castle) even though we knew it was closed for renovation (bummer!). We also saw a public art installation, Venus of the Rags, on the way back to the hotel. Lastly, we stopped by the Galleria Umberto I, a shopping gallery nearby. Kiley got more gelato. All in all, a good day!
Interesting day. I can’t get my head around the junk left strewn about. You would think at some point someone would have wanted the junk or someone would have wanted to clean it up. Different culture for sure.
Also interested in the “tex mex” are you seeing a lot of varieties of food (nationalities)? I guess that would be similar to the US with lots of different types of food.
Also are you seeing any “Normal” areas with grocery stores and drug stores, schools and playground?
Keep the posts coming, I really enjoy them. Cats and the house are good. We are the the Peterson boys. Josh and Steph made it to Vegas without incident. Hope they win some money…
Every time we look on google maps for a restaurant, it is about 90% Italian/pizza! We had to dig a bit to find a different cuisine. We have seen several Asian places, sushi and stuff but they aren’t very common in our experience. We have seen some typical everyday neighborhoods – there is a pharmacy on practically every corner. Kiley says she saw a playground yesterday but I didn’t notice it, I guess. The grocery stores tend to be very small and easily overlooked by us! Definitely not like the US with our super targets and Walmarts.