Wednesday morning we grabbed a typical speedy Italian stand-up breakfast of frothy cappucino and a sweet custard-filled croissant before heading for the train station to pick up our rental car. Having driven out of Rome before we were a little more prepared for the madness of the roads, I simply closed my eyes and let competent Tim take control of our little grey Peugeot. We had programmed our first stop into the GPS already, we were headed for Carrefour, a giant supermarket/homeware store where we stocked up on equipment for our camping adventure.
Then it was onto the Autostrada headed for Naples. We had booked to stay at a camping ground in a place called Pozzuoli which was on the outskirts of Naples, a city notorious for it's crazy traffic, but even though were a good 10km away from the city limits, the road rules still seemed to be completely ignored. So it was a bit of hairy drive up windy, narrow roads to the camping ground, which was right next to a geothermal area. The friendly camp warden reasurred us on arrival that even though the site was in the crater of an active volcano, it was okay because they were able to 'control' it! This made us giggle, but the camp ground was lovely, complete with a swimming pool and sites shaded by giant gum trees. It was lovely to cool off with a swim after setting up our tent, followed by some time spent lazing on the sun loungers. Later on that evening when the temperature dropped a little we went for a wander around the geothermal area, which in all honesty didn't have much on Kuirau Park in Rotorua! But it was quite interesting and we had another giggle at the lack of barriers or warning signage, in some places we were walking over rather hot ground with steam vents coming up all over the place! Who needs health and safety!
Then it was onto the Autostrada headed for Naples. We had booked to stay at a camping ground in a place called Pozzuoli which was on the outskirts of Naples, a city notorious for it's crazy traffic, but even though were a good 10km away from the city limits, the road rules still seemed to be completely ignored. So it was a bit of hairy drive up windy, narrow roads to the camping ground, which was right next to a geothermal area. The friendly camp warden reasurred us on arrival that even though the site was in the crater of an active volcano, it was okay because they were able to 'control' it! This made us giggle, but the camp ground was lovely, complete with a swimming pool and sites shaded by giant gum trees. It was lovely to cool off with a swim after setting up our tent, followed by some time spent lazing on the sun loungers. Later on that evening when the temperature dropped a little we went for a wander around the geothermal area, which in all honesty didn't have much on Kuirau Park in Rotorua! But it was quite interesting and we had another giggle at the lack of barriers or warning signage, in some places we were walking over rather hot ground with steam vents coming up all over the place! Who needs health and safety!
Dinner that night was a camping style pasta meal eaten in the company of millions of mosquitos, whose presense unforutantly we didn't notice until it was too late. There happened to be an open air classical piano concert taking place very near the camp ground so it was lovely to dine with the sound wafting across to our site, and we wandered over after dinner to catch the end of it, such a lovely peaceful end to our day, despite the itchy welts developing on our legs.
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