The ride was not as long as expected, thanks to the effortless driving of Giuseppe. Instead of a 2.5 hour (plus) drive down there, we made it in a little over two hours, each way. It truly is like riding on a cloud in that vehicle. Smooth.
We met with Fabrizio, our contracted guide, for a four hour tour of the site. I was able to hang back a little and took frequent trips out to the coffee stand and cafeteria to hide my distaste of the place frm the clients, and to sneak some photos in to show you all why it's just not my cup of tea here, as evidenced in the plaster casts later in the post.
There's something for everyone here. You can see how people lived and what their proclivities were; the frescoes tell their stories.
The houses were decorated lavishly with frescoes of trompe l'oeil, the shops showing their wares in perpetuity, such as the photo above. The brothels had their "menus" up there for everyone to see what you got for your money and your choosing. This is one of the tame ones:
This particular fresco (below) is not in a brothel, but in a regular house dwelling. Phalluses (phalli?) were a symbol of your wealth, and right there in the vestibule this guy was saying to the world that he's got the world on a string, so to speak. So big he's got to weigh it and show you the heft and bulk of his estate.
Aren't you impressed? Just like the guy revving his Ferrari at the stoplight.
So what happens when the city gets covered in metric tons of ash? It dumps on the houses, on the people in the streets, just everywhere. Covers the bodies and later, after the bodies have decomposed there are spaces where they used to be, and usually the ash was so fitted against them, their features are still present in the ash itself.
Over a hundred years ago, someone came up with a brilliant idea, after discovering these pockets that were in the shapes of human form. So during excavations, they will drill down and pour plaster into the spaces, and render the forms of people caught in their last moments as the ash and gases choked them to death.
It's very sad to me, to capture their faced twisted in agony forever.
Doesn't this just make you all warm and fuzzy inside?
Pompeii bums me out, quite frankly. I've been to places with Roman ruins before, but this was a catastrophic end to a society in one fell swoop.
For my money, I'd rather see Ostia Antica, 45 minutes outside of Rome, on the coast. It is more intact, and there are no plaster cast bodies to be had. The city died out naturally, not by means of natural disaster. But it's Pompeii, people want to see it, even if they don't what they're in for.
On to less grisly subjects.
One thing in Pompeii that does make me smile a little are the dogs. There have always been dogs here. They are a mainstay. They are not starving, there is always someone feeding them. When a group of tourists come in it is almost as if they negotiate which one of them will follow and you're pretty much stuck with them during your time there.
We made it back to Rome without running into the horrible afternoon rush hour traffic. After freshening up we had dinner in the Trastevere neighborhood. It's our last night in the city before we head into Florence.
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