Ma and I have attempted Vesuvius. If you haven’t read the post for the 10th of February on this blog, I’d recommend reading it now – it’ll make a little more sense of what’s to come in this one. You can find it on the calendar (on the left side bar on a laptop or desktop, or scroll down when you’ve clicked for the menu on a phone).
After the 2000+ steps walking down to Amalfi, every member of the group was “oof”ing as they sat down and stood up at breakfast. There was plenty of discussion about whether bums, knees or calves ached most. I was definitely in the calves camp – i tried to stand with my heels off a little step to stretch them out and my calves just said “no”! I’m somewhere in the middle of the group age-wise and I could only imagine it was feeling even achier for the older members of the group, but everyone seemed ready for whatever the day threw at us.
We left on the bus at 8.30am as Paul, our guide for the week, said it would be a long day. We drove to Pompeii and met up with a tour guide called Detori who showed us around. It’s a huge place – far larger than I’d ever imagined, and at the front gate there would have been public baths, with complicated heating and steaming systems, that all entrants to the city had to purify themselves in before they were allowed into the city walls. All of Detori’s talk of sitting, chatting in the warm pools, made me wish they were restored, and I could plunge my body – aching calves and all – into the steaming water. No such luck though, and on we all went, completely unpurified!
Pompeii was fascinating and, right at the end of the tour we were shown into a villa which Ma recognised from her visit when she was pregnant with me. We ate lunch and then jumped back in the bus to head up towards Vesuvius.
We changed into our walking boots and all piled out of the bus to start the climb. As the bus pulled away I said to Ma, “Have you got Grandma?”, at which point she hollered, “Stop that bus, we’ve left Grandma on it!” (which rather answered my question). The lovely Paul looked a bit quizzical, but jumped in front of the bus while Ma went on and retrieved Grandma (or, more accurately, a fifth of Grandma’s ashes). They were in a small, pretty cotton bag, and had been sitting on our headboard, adorned by Mimosa, under a picture of a view Grandma would have loved, for the previous few days.
We walked up the volcano to the edge of the crater, and then started to work our way around the crater. At one point, before the highest peak, our guide – Stefano – said, “This is probably the spot with the best view” and he went on to explain something about the crater. But I wasn’t listening. Our drive for bringing Grandma to Italy was to find her a brilliant view, and here was one looking out at the Bay of Naples, and across to Capri – she’d have loved it. So, while Stefano chatted on, I checked the wind direction (I’ve heard some bad ash-scattering stories!) and threw the ashes to the side of the volcano. Vesuvius is covered in ash, so it made not a jot of difference to anyone. Except us. A few of the men in the group doffed their caps to my gorgeous Grandma, and we all walked on. And we made it to the top!
So that’s another mountain Ma has under her belt. And Grandma can forever look at Capri and the beautiful, glittering sea around it, and imagine herself passing the time of day with Gracie Fields. A good day!
