We had pre-booked an excursion to see the Roman site at Pompeii and Mount Vesuvio, so we had an early start to catch the hotel bus down in time to pick up the coach from Amalfi to Pompeii .
We arrived there about 11 and after buying water, sorting out tickets, radios to hear the guide (of dubious value, due to their very short range), started our tour.
We were most impressed by the scale and state of preservation of site.
The casts of victims of the ash were extremely poignant, but be aware that many of the famous artefacts are actually in the museum in Naples.
2 hours was nowhere near enough time to see the site - two days would've been more useful, but our guide did a good job of showing us the important sites (not the amphitheatre though, which was some distance from
the entrance) and a wide variety of shops, houses, trade and government buildings, markets and even brothels in the time and in the hot sun (and with little shelter from it) most on the tour agreed much longer would have been hard work.
Lauren was much taken with the semi-wild dogs that roam the site, although must were sleeping in the shade during our visit.
After lunch (basic, but ok) at Marcus et Caesar at Pompeii, we reboarded the bus and after a short stop at a cameo factory (clever but not our thing really) we drove up Vesuvio to the end of the road at 1000 metres altitude.
We bought more water and headed up the loose path to the live crater.
In the heat, the zig zag path was a hard, but not unduly so, climb and there was a little breeze to take the edge of the sun's heat at this altitude - It was easier in terms of the heat than Pompeii had been.
The view of the coast from the top was glorious, but aside from knowing you were on a huge ticking bomb, Vesuvio itself was just like any big hill, just with a hole in the middle.
We didn't see any smoke from the crater although others on our bus said they had - I suspect some had mistaken wisps of cloud blowing over the top for smoke.
Tue 12th august - Positano and the Emerald Grotto
We took the scheduled bus service to the Emerald Grotto on Tuesday, as our rep had told us that it was better than the Blue Grotto on Capri, local and much cheaper.
It was very small and more Turquoise than Emerald. The guide did his best to entertain in variety of languages but it was a bit disappointing frankly, after our rep hyped it up and took less than 10
minutes to see - It wasn't expensive, but I could happily have missed it.
We had a lemon ice (Lemon's being the Amalfi speciality, with the hillsides covered with groves) in a pottery across the road from the grotto entry, whilst we waited for the next bus and then continued onto Positano.
My life flashed before my eyes a few times as our driver tried to make up time, due to some delays back in Amalfi - I like driving, but I was constantly relieved not to be driving on the Amalfi coast in the height
of the tourist season.
We made it and got off the bus at top of Positano, which is built down the hill to the sea. We then wended our way down 1,000s of steps in narrow alleys to crowded shops clustered around the
small beach area.
To be honest, once you're there, there's not much to see so we bought boat tickets back to Amalfi and after Mandy and the kids took another quick look round shops (and I sat and enjoyed the scenery) boarded.
The boat provided a fast and picturesque journey back, which was enhanced by the excitement of watching a helicopter fighting a forest fire on a hillside.
