Grant and Michael's Excellent Adventure: July 2012

Hey crew, sorry it took so long for me to get back to this. It has been a hectic week since my return to the US of A. Let me rewind all the way back to our departing of Rome...

We caught the 11:00 AM train out of the city on Friday, June 29th, and took it to a town called Salerno. From th ere we jumped on a bus that took us into Amalfi. THen we took another bus that brought us to a quant little town that we would stay in called Agerola (we never quite figured out how to say it correctly, but we're pretty sure it was a soft "G" and maybe a couple of other letters that you wouldn't think are in there?) Anways we got to the quaint little town in the mountains not far from the sea around 5. Not before we of course got lost, got off on the wrong bus stop and had to hoof it to the hostel (it was only about a mile away, but still the bus drops off 20 feet from the hostel we were staying at. It was a mistake we only had to make once) Once our stuff was properly dropped off we talked to a few other people that were staying in the hostel, and they highly reccomended a place to grab some pizza (not surprised are you?) that was right around the corner. Obviously that was the next stop then, so we grabbed some pizza and a bottle of wine there (Wine was only 2 euros here - in the restraunt. WHAT?) and then we had a nice relaxed evening.

The next day, Saturday, we had a beach day. Perfect weather, and we were blessed with another rocky beach - oh well. The water still felt great. Apparently personal space isn't a thing on the Amalfi coast, because people put there towels down litereally right next to us - it didn't matter that there was plenty of room on the beach not 2 inches from us. Maybe we looked good, or smelled good? I don't really know. After our fill of the sun and the beach, and narrowly escaping a nasty sunburn we headed back to Agerola for some dinner. Pizza again, you guessed it. It was at a different restaraunt this time though. The pizza was even better, and the wine was still just 2 euros, so there was no complaining out of our mouths. That night there were fireworks that went off as we were having our late dinner. We aren't sure why they went off, but we assumed it was the festival that went on in the town a few days later. After dinner we headed back to the hostel, and made friends with our fellow hostel mates, shared some wine, and called it a night.

The next day, July 1st we woken up by church bells early in the moring, and every hour after that. We took the day to just relax, get some reading done, and go on small walks over to the coast and around town as we scavenged for food. We also played some card games with our new friends, and we were amazed with how early the celebrations started for the finals of the EuroCup (although if the Chiefs made the superbowl I would probably start early too) So after the day of just relaxing and hanging out we grabbed an early dinner. Guess what we had? Wrong, we got pasta tonight, which was very delicious. Although I guess you were part right on your guess, we did get some more wine (When in Rome right? - well close enough here) So after dinner, which we timed experly, we went to the town square to catch the game. It was a much more mild crowd than what we had in Rome, which is probably good, because Italy unfortunately got smoked. 4-0. An Italian guy told us after the game that he would have felt lucky if they beat Spain, so I suppose its good that they had a good attitude about it. After the game we talked to our new friends for a few more minutes before we headed into bed.

Monday the 2nd we were up, out the door, and on our way into Pompeii before 10 AM. It took us a little over an hour to get to Pompeii, and once we were there we jumped on the first bus that took us to the famous Volcano that destroyed the town, Mount Vesuvius. The bus took us part way up the Volcano, and from there we on our own to climb it. After making the climb up the mountain/volcano we spent about an hour marveling at the power of it, and how mighty the explosion must have been to blow the top off the mountain and destroy the town 7 miles away, and add in all the sea shore. (it added 5 miles of coast, because Pompeii used to be a port town before the eruptions) After climbing around there all day we headed down into the city of Pompeii. The best preserved Roman city, because well, it was covered/preserved by volcanic ash and rock. It was all very cool. Anyways after we wondered around the city for another few hours we headed back to the station to make our way back on the 5:15 bus. We didn't make the 5:15 bus, so we had to wait to get on the 6:30 bus. It all worked out ok though. We got back around 8 and we had one priority at that point. Get food, we were both so hungry we were getting sick. So we got back and our new friends joined us for the meal. When we headed back a bunch of new people had showed up to the hostel. They were all British, and closer to our age, so we went out on the portch and introduced ourselves to them, and socialized for our last night in the Amalfi region.

The next day we woke up, and took the bus into Furore, where we were ablot to see the Marisa Cuomo vineyard. We knew very little about it, but it came highly reccomended. We found out on arrival, that it was one of the top up and coming vineyards in Italy and definitely one of the best in the southern half. So after we picked up a few bottles to bring home, we headed back to our hostel to pick up our stuff and head into Naples to catch our plane home the next day. It took until our final stop to not have to wonder at all to find our hostel. Thats right folks, we found it on our first try, no asking for help or anything. So we got checked in and asked where the best place to get pizza was. There is no need to be judgemental on this pizza order, this is where pizza was invented. So we were pointed in the right direction, and took off. The pizza was the best we have ever had. I'm not sure i can eat another pizza and consider it good after this work of art. Infact, the pizza place had awards everywhere and pictures of the presidents from the United States of America that had visited the restaraunt. After that we found some delcious canolis for desert, and saw a little bit of then town of Naples as well as picked up a few souveniers to bring home on our walk back to the hostel. We got back around 10 and watched a movie, that well, it had no ending, so we think it was going for an indy/artsy angle? Whatever. We had one more glass of wine to celebrate the end of a great trip, and a local drink called lemoncelo before we headed to bed.

The next day, the 4th of July, we declared our independence from Europe and tried to head home. With hopes to see the 4th of July concert in New York City featuring Katy Perry and Kenny Chesney as well as the biggest firework display in the country set to the tune of various patriotic songs. Unfortunately we didn't get to see any of this because our plane was 4 hours late taking off. Once we finally did get in though, and made it through customs, and waited to get our bags we headed to time square. It was cool and patriotic, but we were both exhausted and worried about making our flights, so we said goodbye to eachother and Grant made his way towards LaGuardia Airport and Michael made his way into Newark, New Jersey. We both reached home on the 5th safely around 1 PM central time.

Thanks for all of your thoughts and prayers, and reading our blog throughout our journey. Hopefully you enjoyed it, it let you follow us, or hopefully gave you laugh or two.