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| Map of Gulf of Napoli |
As we had an early morning flight to Naples on 27th
April I booked us into a Premier Inn hotel at Gatwick Airport the night before
so we wouldn’t have to stay up all night travelling. The hotel was at the North Terminal where we
were due to fly from so after we checked in we had a look around the airport
and had a last drink and cake in Costa before retiring to bed at 10pm. I had had to ask clever son how to set the
alarm on my phone (we even tested it out so I would know what to do do!) but
even so I worried about whether it would go off and if it didn’t we’d oversleep
and miss our flight. This didn’t help to
induce sleep, nor did the couple in the room next door (thin walls) who were
doing a spot of ‘horizontal jogging’ and she was all ‘yes, yes, yes’!! Then loads of chat. Was I ever going to sleep? I did off and on and when the alarm did go
off, at the right time, it sent me into a spin because it sounded so loud and
I’m sure three rooms on either side heard it!
We crept around (it was 3am) and checked out at 4am just as they were
beginning to serve breakfast – no time for that. All this end (UK) went well. It was a lovely morning as we took off at 6.05am. I always enjoy the take-off and landing (even
though it’s the most dangerous time of flight), that fun fair feeling in the
tummy and the excitement. We flew out
over the south coast – Bognor to be exact – it looked beautiful in the early
sunshine.
We climbed higher over the sea, saw the coast of France
but as we flew further we encountered cloud and were unable to see much else
until we descended down towards Naples (Napoli) Airport (9.40am local time) through
the cloud and ran into rain! Even so,
the first glimpse of Italy was great – all those tall colourful apartments,
even the motorways (like our orbital system) excited me. It was 15 degrees outside and umbrellas were
needed on the walk to our transfer coach.
We settled back to enjoy the journey to Sorrento, our stay for the
week.
What views we saw, even in the rain the coastline was
impressive as we drove with Napoli Bay to our right. Our tour guide gave us a running commentary
of where we were, some history and an outline for our weeks stay, including a
meeting the following day to book any extra tours we would like. As we neared Sorrento (driving through
several mountain tunnels) we hit traffic jams and our arrival time stretched to
almost double by the time we reached our hotel.
By this time we were tired and hungry.
The reason for the delay was road works.
There was a cycle trial due over the next Bank Holiday weekend and they
were preparing. (In fact we learnt when
back in England that the cycle race was on the island of Ischia and Bradley
Wiggins was taking part).
Finally, we checked into the Hotel Metropole and room 204
on the second floor was ours. My first
impression of the room was ‘oh, not what I expected’. It was dark and felt cold. We put a light on to see and realised that
the shutters were closed so little light could get in. We dumped our cases and went to the bar for a
snack (it was after 1pm local time by now and the food stopped at 2pm). We ordered hot drinks and a sandwich then went
back to the room unpacked, opened the shutters but left the inner glass doors
shut, and admired the view, which even in the rain was lovely – all trees,
olives and a fig – and so green. The
ground rose up to a great height.
Everything is built on rock with villas and hotels perched in the
trees. Still cold and very tired we both
went to bed!
Dinner was at 7pm and we were down first. I wondered what there would be for a
vegetarian like me but I need not have worried.
Every day there was soup and usually a veggie main course option, but
after two omelettes in the week I couldn’t face a third so I asked for one of
the starters as a main and they were happy to do that. Breakfasts was a buffet affair including croissants,
fruit, yogurt, cake, cereal, toast, rolls, jam, cheese, slices of some sort of
ham, scrambled eggs and tea/coffee. The
waiters were at times a little ‘Faulty Towers’ like – one used to hover looking
out of the window, one sang and chatted to himself; they were mainly elderly
waiters except for two who worked mainly in the bar. They were nice, efficient and amusing. I ordered a pot of tea on the first night
because I was craving for it. That’s
what I miss most when abroad, no tea making facilities! I never realised how much tea means to
me. Anyway, after dinner I felt a little
better but still cold and tired and we were in bed by 8pm and I just crashed
out! (We later learnt that another couple asked for the heating to be put on in
their room that first night. Wish I’d
thought of that!) Hear ends the first
day – arrival day.
(Part 2 tomorrow)
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