7 June - Naples
After 14 hours of travel from Seattle through Paris and finally into Naples, the adventure truly began. Before we even left home I had looked up how to get from the airport to the Airbnb. With a Eurail pass for city-to-city travel, we did not want to wrestle with public transit right off the bat at 6pm, so we grabbed an official white taxi. I had the address pulled up on my phone and showed it to the nice, skinny old man behind the wheel, and off we went.
That ride was an adventure all by itself. I do not know what the rest of Italy is like, but Naples traffic has its own set of rules, and those rules appear to be made up on the spot. There were several moments I was convinced we were going to swap paint with someone. The taxi moved with absolute conviction through the chaos, so I made a conscious decision to stop watching the road and just look out the window and soak in the city.
Our first stop was Bar Guida. In the madness of the taxi ride I had forgotten to message Giovanni, our Airbnb host, that we were on our way. I took care of that from Bar Guida. He responded quickly and about 15 minutes later rolled up on his scooter. Classic. Do not even get me started on the sheer volume of scooters zipping by. Giovanni gave us a quick rundown of the city in a heavy Italian accent that was mostly intelligible, then walked us to where we would be staying for the next two nights. I could say plenty about the stairs, but I have a feeling Pam will cover that ground. Shout out to Giovanni for offering to carry her backpack up the outdoor steps to the door.
He gave us a quick tour of the small Airbnb. Small is the right word, but lovely for what we needed. Then he handed us the key. The key. A skeleton key. I took a picture of the thing and stood there thinking, what century am I in right now?
We got settled and hit the street for food and whatever else the evening had to offer. Giovanni had given us a rough layout of the neighborhood, so we headed in the direction of the action. Walking those streets, the sheer density of shops was everything I always wish American city centers were. Shops everywhere, and if you are into fashion, you would have been dangerous with a credit card. By the time we got out there, the shops were closing up and the bars and restaurants were coming to life. We were apparently a little early.
We found a spot and did our best to figure out how to order. Thank god for Google Translate live mode. The waitress also spoke enough English to get us sorted. The place was nice and had outdoor seating, but was not quite as buzzing as I had hoped. We ate, learned the local payment system (get your table number, take it inside to pay), and headed back toward the Airbnb. On the way, we stumbled onto a street absolutely alive with nightlife. That would have been worth a couple more hours, but we filed it away.
We tried to pop into a bar to buy a bottle of wine. The hostess said sure, then very much did not sell us a bottle of wine and handed us cocktails instead. Defeated, we drank them, admired the artwork on the walls, and moved on. Just before the Airbnb we found a wine shop still open and ducked in.
Once we figured out the mini-split and converted Celsius to Fahrenheit, we settled in for the night. If the rest of this trip is going to be anything like those first four hours, we are in for one hell of a good time.
