August 24, 79 AD – Mount Vesuvius erupts, Pompeii dies.
In October 2002 I went on a Holiday Fellowship (HF) walking tour in Italy with my partner and two good friends, Ann and Kelly. The trip was organized as a celebration, of sorts, and was the first time I had been on an HF trip.
We were around twenty people in the group, not including two guides from HF. Our home base was a hotel in Sorrento and every day there were two organized hikes. The guides planned them so one was moderate and one was more challenging. The tour group included a wide spread of ages and all were congenial folks, with us being the only people from the US. The rest of the participants were from England, Scotland, Australia and Canada.
On one of the day hikes we visited Pompeii.
The ruins were really quite incredible,
but what I enjoyed even more were some of the fine details found in and around the buildings.
Notice how the color and detail of wall decoration is still vibrant nearly 2000 years after it was buried.
Pompeii had a good infrastructure for moving traffic around. Some of the lanes limited the size of vehicle that could be used with designed interference and many had a sort of decoration or lane marking of inlaid white rocks.
The city had a vibrant and wealthy merchant trade, as well as sophisticated infrastructure for getting water to the inhabitants.
This was the only day hike that was unstructured. It gave us the freedom to explore Pompeii as we each saw fit. In addition, for a few extra Lira, this lovely local gentleman provided historical perspective and color commentary for a portion of the excursion.
During this trip I became an “owner” in Holiday Fellowship, which is a cooperative society. There is a Holiday Fellowship trip in the planning stages for Scotland.
