I was naive in my expectations of Pompeii and so I was completely taken aback when we bought the guide book and stepped inside the walls. The scale of the city was mind blowing – I, somewhat stupidly, had not realised that there was an entire city excavated and so found it an incredible experience to see so much left in tact. The mosaics, wall murals, bakery’s with ovens, gardens, roman baths, theatres, brothels….not to mention the plaster casts of the buried bodies. If you haven’t been – go there but do as we did and get lost as you end up totally alone away from the tourists walking in peace down 2000 year old roads.

This was proceeded by the 4×4 up mount Vesuvius…..I’m not the bravest person in the world and I was a little nervous when we got on the minibus for the first stage of the trip with the driver attempting to beat the land speed record for a bus. We hopped off the bus, slight wobbly legs from me, and we’re confronted, not with the little 4×4 jeep we had imagined but instead what looked like a tank mixed with a monster truck. This trundled up the Volcano taking the corners at what to the feeble ones of us seemed like an alarming rate. The view got better and better as Pompeii and the surrounding coast got smaller and smaller beneath us. We then completed the final leg of the journey a 2 mile hike up to the very top of the volcano. The view was breathtaking and my nerves quickly subsided. We loved the little old couple who ran the shop at the top who had a tiny green fiat panda parked next up outside – how delightful to drive up and down a volcano every day to get to work!

Our very basic campsite did us well but quickly realised that those around us were only staying one or two nights and then moving on – we clung on for three nights before making the next move. We travelled along the coast away past a town called Salerno and headed to Camping Paestum which we had thought was a beach side resort. Great place but a bit far away from the beach and completely infested with Lizards. So after a night drinking with the locals and watch Italy get to the Euro finals we popped down the road to Camping MiraMare which has a pool, private beach and a very nice old guy running the place who i chat to in French as this is our best bet of understanding each other. We are the only non-Italians here as it is more of a perminant/second home for locals to come to the beach for the weekend – so we plan to spend a few nights here making the most of the sea breeze as it is expected to be 37degs this weekend.

We have not seen a toilet seat (apart from one night in hotel and the swanky Rome campsite) since we arrived in Italy. Apparently this invention has been rendered useless by the Italians but we think maybe this is because they seem to have enough to have passionate arguments about without adding in who left the toilet seat up….