View from Castel Sant'Elmo |
Naples has a reputation for being dangerous and dirty, although people that live there or have visited generally reject these assumptions. It is busy, chaotic, and very polluted, but you don’t feel unsafe walking around (although the traffic takes some getting used to!). Take care of your personal possessions, as you should anywhere you visit, but don’t let its reputation put you off visiting. It’s worth factoring in some time to just wander around the maze of streets and experience the bustling city first hand.
There’s plenty to see in Naples including three castles. Castel
Sant’Elmo sits proudly above the city, an imposing fortress that has often been
used as a military outpost. It now hosts art exhibitions and offers beautiful
views over Naples. If you don’t want to climb the hill to get to it, there’s a
funiculare that will take you nearby.
Inside Castel dell'Ovo |
Head toward the harbour and you can’t miss Castel dell’Ovo guarding
the bay. It is the oldest standing fortification in Naples and the peninsula on
which it sits used to be the island Megaride. It is free to enter and there are
information boards explaining its varied history including being used as the
seat of the Royal Chamber and State Treasury, as a prison, and as a defense
structure during many periods of unrest.
Follow the harbour round and you will soon find yourself at Castel
Nuovo which has been used frequently as a royal residence over the years. Today
it hosts a museum, chapel, and library. A short walk from here will bring you
to the Piazza del Plebiscito, on one side a royal palace, on the other an
impressive church.
If you’re tired of tourist attractions by this point and want a bite
to eat or to do some shopping, the Galleria Umberto I is just around the
corner. An impressive nineteenth century shopping gallery with domed ceilings
and mosaics lining the floors. It’s worth popping in to see it but pass through
it and head into the narrow side streets and you’ll find a wide variety of
pizzerias and trattorias where you can eat a delicious meal and have change
from €10.
Galleria Umberto I |
Approximately half an hour walk from here takes
you to Napoli Sotterranea where you can go on a guided tour of the underground
sections of the city. Here you’ll learn about the devastation that Naples
suffered during the Second World War and how they converted tunnels they’d been
using for rubbish for decades into bomb shelters, walk along ancient aqueducts,
and even see some flowers growing 40 metres underground. Opposite the entrance
to the tour you’ll find Christmas Alley, where you can pick up handmade
Christmas decorations all year round.
A ruined temple at Pompeii |
Few travellers will stop in Naples without
visiting Pompeii or Herculaneum. Easily accessible by the Circumvesuviana which
departs from Garibaldi, allow a full day to walk the Pompeii excavations.
Herculaneum is a smaller site as the new city was built over the remains and so
it’s unlikely the whole city will ever be fully uncovered. Although Pompeii is
the far more popular site, Herculaneum is worth a visit. Its proximity to Vesuvius
means that it was destroyed and therefore preserved, in a slightly different
way. The hot ash carbonised wood, preserving features that were destroyed at
Pompeii, and more of the buildings have upper floors and wall paintings still
intact.
Remains of a building in the excavations of Herculaneum |
As it’s a smaller site it’s possible to combine
a day trip with going up Vesuvius. There is a tour company that operates from
Ercolano Scavi station. They’ll drive you the majority of the way up the
volcano and you then have an hour and a half to climb to the summit yourself,
just enough time to get there and back with a few photo stops.
If you’ve not reached archaeological saturation
point, the National Archaeological Museum in Naples is a popular tourist spot
as it houses the majority of treasures unearthed in the excavations, moved to
the museum to aid in their conservation.