SATURDAY 9TH - CIVITAVECCHIA – THE PORT FOR ROME

 

The photo above is for the kids. There are a series of car ferries we encounter not infrequently of the Moby line and there are all painted with different cartoon characters. Hopefully I can get some more.

Today was spent in Civitavecchia, the access port for Rome. Most of the passengers went to Rome so Civitavecchia was quite peaceful insofar as tourists went but it is so Italian in that we were harangued by six different tour promotors as we got off the shuttle bus from the ship, all shouting at us and each other, trying to get us to go on their tour to Rome. We took great delight in disappointing them.

The other very Italian thing we saw was road rage Italian style. One driver was driving slowly up a narrow street while talking on his phone. The following driver was shouting at him to no avail. Then the first driver stopped to pick somebody up which caused the following driver to up tempo. That resulted in the first driver getting out of his car to tell the following driver what he thought of him. They may still be there.

 

Like Livorno, Civitavecchia is very much a commercial port but the old town is quite quaint. As with Livorno, it was substantially destroyed in the second world war. Prior to that, the water front areas has been substantially damaged by a major tidal wave in 1941. The waterfront areas are in great shape now and, if you overlook the commercial activity, the harbour is quite attractive. The fact that it is a commercial port means that there is never any shortage of interesting activity to observe from our verandah.

There was a traditional market on today and Bernie needs a hat with a brim. We found exactly what he needed in the market but Bernie and the seller couldn't agree on price. The seller wouldn't go below seven euro and Bernie wouldn't go above five. Bernie is still looking for a hat.

We went for the obligatory walk along the beachfront. The beaches here are quite large gravel stones. Footwear seems to be essential until you are actually in the water.

Tomorrow we go on our first organised excursion – Pompeii from Naples. When we were last in this part of the world, we went to Herculaneum, another city buried by Vesuvius, but we haven't visited Pompeii before.