NAPOLI!

I've been in Naples for over 24 hours, walking around in the summery weather and taking in the magnificent views! No wonder it was the area where the wealthiest, most powerful Romans of the ancient world chose to build their vast palaces and sumptuous villas! Despite the often squalid accretions of the modern city, the setting remains beyond compare!
Vesuvius, the living volcano that has destroyed - and yet preserved - so much, looms over the entire scene, which is broadly defined by the limitless expanse of the blue bay; and in the distance you can see the mountainous Sorrentine Peninsula snaking outward, and even farther the misty, floating silhouette of mythic Capri. It's all pure magic, the overwhelming beauty of planet earth all distilled, intensified, and concentrated in one spot. Along with the overwhelmingly untamable power of Nature!
It must be the combination of such extreme beauty with the equally extreme menace that makes Neapolitans so uniquely who they are, so energized and seemingly always ready to seize the day, moment to moment, with all their might and sense of joy!
Naples is a city that is simultaneously unearthing its layered past, literally, and somehow pushing and shoving its way willy-nilly into the future. Everywhere there are open excavations: burrowings into the ground to discover an ancient Greek agora or a sacred Roman hypogeum, or vast trenches dug or tunnels bored to install the latest high-tech power cables, or the long-awaited new subway system. Construction pits clustered and jumbled with cutting-edge machinery, tanks, pipes, and cranes are found to yawn right next to graceful gardens and pristine palaces stuffed full of priceless paintings, porcelains, and sculptures, the elegant, refined residue of centuries past.
There is no place like Naples, so ancient, so overflowing with stunning exaggerations of loveliness, danger, and the unbridled chaos of life fully lived!

TERREMOTO

3:30 AM
The Hour of the Wolf in Central Italy this morning brought roughly swaying beds as a frightening wake-up call. My hostess and I met in the hallway, my first comment, "Are we in California?" and hers "I hope it isn't Assisi again" (she's a medieval scholar and also has strong family connections to Assisi). In Rome it proved to be nothing more than 30 seconds of the palazzo lurching, but along the nearby mountainous spine of the country, in L'Aquila, Abruzzo, it was a true living nightmare, with at least 26 dead in the medieval rubble.

Rome Walk

Around the historic center and Trastevere today. Lunch at my favorite vegetarian restaurant, where I've been going for over 15 years - I chose everything they had with artichokes. Two cappuccinos today, plus some amazing gelato - ginger, white chocolate, and lemon meringue pie flavors - on Via dei Coronari, the street with high-end antique shops all up and down. Tomorrow morning I meet with the writers who will work with me on updating the Time Out Naples guide. Tomorrow evening there's an art gallery 'crawl'.
Nine more days in Rome, then down to Napoli for 3 weeks!

Roma Today

Not a cloud in the sky! Bellissimo!

For dinner yesterday, we had wholewheat pasta with radicchio, followed by salad featuring tomatoes grown in volcanic soil, fresh basilico, and bianchi di spagna beans. Blood oranges from Sicily for dessert and pure chocolate chunks with tiny bits of rock salt embedded in them.

Roma!

Bella Roma has given me a warm but very wet welcome on my return after about a year and a half. It feels wonderful to be here; I've already indulged in several cappuccinos and even a couple of tramezzini with artichoke hearts and mozzarella - heaven!
The weather report is promising, so I'll have photos soon.
Ciao a tutti!
Bacioni & abbracci!