Amalfi

Ask anyone around and they'll tell you to go to the Amalfi coast, that it is one of the most gorgeous places in Southern Italy.  So I decided to take a day trip from Salerno to the town of Amalfi.  While I know now that I should have gone to another town, like Sorento, the drive was still amazing as we wound along a small mountain road overlooking the sea and passing through these adorable little villages.  So while I found Amalfi to be an overpriced tourist trap (6 euro for a pastry and coffee) town the scenery was amazing.

Round point along the coast of Amalfi.

Ceramic mosaic, Amalfi is known for their ceramics.  (Does it say something about my cynacism that when looking at some pieces in a souvenir shop I actually turned them over to see if they said- Made in China.)

Miniture village scene along the road.  Apparently it was very popular in the South to make minitures of town life to complement nativity scenes.

A good way to remove trash.

Still not sure about this fountain.

Amazing gold-leaf covered church.

Views along the coast.

Enchanted Garden

Salarno, Italy's magnificent light display.  They covered an entire park in lights and call it the Enchanted Garden.  It looks like you're walking through a set on Avatar.          

The Salamandar

The domain of the Butterfly Fairy

One of the fairies

The solar system belongs to a different light installation in Salerno.  This one was my favorite.

Agropoli

Upon leaving San Felice I had Anna drop me off in the nearby seaside town of Agropoli.  I could tell she was a little worried since I didn't seem to know where I was going or staying.  I was worried too (especially since the one hostel in the entire town was closed for the season) but I wasn't going to let her know that.  Instead I had her drop me off along the seaside where I knew from my brief phone book research that there were a number of B&B's and small hotels.  I quickly discovered that Agropoli was down for the tourist season and things would be too expensive for me but the nice man at the hotel gave me a glass of wine and let me use the internet so I could take an hour and get myself sorted out.  Then I hid my stuff in the bar and went out to explore the town before taking a bus north to Salerno.  Here's what I found:

The beachfront with a view of the old town and castle on the hill.

A memorial to those who served in the war in Iraq.

A very long and steep street leading to the old town.

Old church

The locks on the railing is something Italian kids got from a movie.  So now young couples write their names on a lock and place it on a bridge railing, or in this case on the railing of the overlook.

  A better shot of the old town over the water.

Sunday Stroll or Paestum

It's Sunday. I've spent a full week on the farm and I could use a break. It's been decided I need to visit Paestum, ruins of an ancient Greek city that are only about 10k away. My hosts have a soft spot for this little touristy town, there is a giant wedding photo of them posing at the big temple. Having spent the last two weeks running around Tunisia looking at the ruins of ancient Roman cities I'm not super excited but I figure it will be a nice change of scenery from the farm.
Anna volunteers to go with me and I figure it will be nice to walk around and try to carry on a conversation in my busted Italian. Turns out she was only going as far as dropping me off. Talk about feeling like I was back in junior high, getting dropped off at the mall with instructions to be back at this door in an hour. Still it was nice, I got out and was able to get some gelato, they even gave me a heart shaped wafer cookie. Oh and of course I got to see some cool Greek temples. I've actually seen so many ruins that I've now gotten the knack of picking out building functions based on their design.
Here are some photos of Pasteum:

Web without Charlotte

I noticed a spider's web on the fence of the pig's pen the other morning. I wondered what I would do if one day I came out and saw the words "some pig" scrolled out instead of the geometric designs. I wondered if something like that would save the pig when he got too fat. Little did I know that his numbered days were quickly coming to a close. Two days later they took my pig out of his pen and turned him into pounds of ham and bacon. I was out in the field weeding away when they came for him. He tried to run but it was three against one and eventually they got him. All the other animals were upset, all of them knew what was happening, most of all the pig. I could hear him screaming up until the very end and I nearly threw up in the hay. So now I'll never know if a little arachnid propaganda could have saved him but I doubt anything could have that day.

WWOOF San Felice

Keeko the dog who followed me around everywhere.

Anna, who ran the farm

I've had a lot of labels over the years: pharmacy tech, cashier, student, Peace Corps volunteer, teacher and now I can add farm hand to the list. Willing Workers on Organic Farms (WWOOF) has branches worldwide and I choose to sign up with the one in Italy. I found out about if from some PC friends and figured it would be a nice way to transition between Africa and America. It also crosses off one important item on my life list: Learn how to cook in Italy.
Waiting in the train station in some random town in Southern Italy, was I nervous. You bet. I was waiting for a complete stranger to come pick me up, to go someplace I had only seen from their website, not knowing exactly what to expect or if they spoke any English or French. Sure I've done something like this before but that time I had the US Government backing me up. Now I was just going off on my own crazy crackpot idea.
I wound up in a small valley at the edge of Cilento National Park, not far from the sea at a small family run farm where they sell fresh produce and preserves. The family is nice, the work isn't hard (although it can be tiring) and the scenery is gorgeous. Since things are slow I start my day around 8:30, starting out by feeding the pig and the horse. Normally they are waiting for me impatiently and it's hard to drop the pig his food without dumping it all on his head as he eagerly scarfs down grain. The horse wonders why I'm not hurrying up and feeding her already and gives the fence a sharp wrap. The dog runs over to see what I'm up to and keeps stopping me so I'll pet him, which only makes the horse want me to hurry up more. Then I mostly straighten up around the place. If I go to work up the hill where they have all the olive trees I can look out and see the sea.
All in all it's a good experience though it can be tiring, especially with the language barrier. After spending a month there I decided it's time to move along. Because we have trouble communicating I feel weird being there like some sort of creepy stranger. Plus I don't have access to things like internet which I really need if I want to accomplish some of the goals I have for myself, like trying to find a job. So it's on to other things.

You know you’ve read too much historical fiction

You know you've read too much historical fiction when you still imagine traveling by boat will be like something out of Titanic. I had images of walking out onto the dock and up a wooden gangplank, people running aboard at the last minute, crowds waving goodbye to loved ones with white handkerchiefs floating in the breeze as people on the boat lean over the railing to call one last farewell. Clearly I've read too many novels and so has Jess because we both had the same vision and we both got a good chuckle at how silly we were. The "Gare Maritime" or Boat station in English was much like a modern day airport with a food court, souvenir shop, money changer, and pain in the ass customs officials. I'm actually still really annoyed at the woman who decided to put my exit stamp on the last page of my passport- you know the page with all the US government endorsements on it- what an idiot.
Any way we had a joke going off our very antiquated ideas, it actually started the night before as we were discussing travel in the time of Henry James or Jane Austin. You know you go by train or the mail coach (shared transport) and you arrive at a city and set up lodgings and you usually have letters of introduction so you can make friends with people already situated in the city so you could go to all the best parties, and young ladies always had a chaperone but still tried to sneak in some time with the dashing young hero anyway.
With Lonely Planet listing off hotels and the internet to inform you of events or put you in touch with people living in a certain city you don't to have much advance knowledge of a place or even an acquaintance in a town to travel these days and a chaperone is unheard of. But the spirit of travel is still the same, strangers in strange lands will almost always be willing to help one another out, even if it is only directions to the nearest coffee house, and make fellow travelers feel welcome. While chaperones are a thing of the past for adult women, most women still don't travel alone and when they are single they still give a sly smile to the dashing young man across the restaurant. So while the times have changed and our manner of traveling has too the spirit is similar.
So with that in mind I was given a mission before I got on the boat: Find a nice elderly lady to be my chaperone and get myself a handsome young man.


*Please note that while I technically failed I did, to some measure at any rate, achieve both objectives within two hours of arriving in Italy. I met a pleasant British lady who I thought was going to be my chaperone (at least until we reached the city center) but she found a dashing young man to give her a lift and ditched me. Then I was approached by a young-ish man who followed me down the street to tell me he thought I was beautiful- alas he was the greasy guy working at the local pizza place.