Potluck Tour Guides in Pompeii

For most of our trip, when we set out to see something popular or touristy (think statute of David, the Colosseum, or the Sistine Chapel) we booked a tour with the professionals.  We knew early on in our trip planning that we wanted to visit Pompeii but staying in Salerno rather than the more expensive Naples/Sorrento areas limited our tour options.  By a lot as there are only a handful of tours leaving from Salerno and none of them quite fit our needs/wants.

This is easily remedied as you can hire a tour guide via Airbnb Experiences who will meet you at the gates of Pompeii (I’m rather proud of this turn of phrase!  Much more impressive than “the entrance to the archeological park…”) or you can hire someone while you’re standing in line to get tickets.

We did neither of these things.  While I’ve no issue with Airbnb Experiences (hello amazing Cinque Terre boat trip!), we were in the area towards the end of our trip.  It’s hard to judge exactly how much energy we’re going to have so we didn’t want to commit to a specific date and time.  The tour guides hounding us to hire them while we stood in line to buy tickets?  Let’s just say I have trust issues and leave it at that.

Track 2 vs Track 2TR

And so it came to pass that on our last full day in Salerno, we took a regional train to Pompeii.  We did all the normal things.  We arrived at the station in a timely manner.  We went to the self service kiosk and bought the right number of tickets to the right destination.  We looked at the departures board and we determined that our train left from platform 2.

Okay so it left from 2TR but that “TR” isn’t important right?  We go up the stairs to the platform and get stopped by a security guard who is making sure that everyone has a ticket.  No freeloaders allowed!  Well we had done the right thing and had tickets.  We show him the tickets and he tells us that this isn’t our train.  I respond that I know the train leaving from 3 isn’t ours but 2 is.  He lets us on the platform.

A fast train to Naples comes and goes.  The time of departure for our train comes and goes without a train ever coming.  Our security guard shoots the breeze with other security guards.  I notice that the next train leaves from track 1TR instead of the 2/2TR that we’re standing on so we go down the stairs and back up by platform 1.

It’s at this point that I notice a sign.  It’s not an obvious sign mind you but it does indicate that platforms 1TR – 3TR are that a way.  Apparently this station has 2 different tracks 1-3.  Moral of the story: if the departures board says your train leaves from 2TR, you’d best find 2TR and not 2!

Zone VIII

We arrive at the gates of Pompeii and swarmed in with the other tourists via the Porta Marina Inferiore (inferior door?)  I had snagged a map but there was really only one path to travel, along the Viale delle Ginestre.

Viale delle Ginestre led us directly to Station 11 in Zone VIII (Quadriportico dei teatri o Caserma dei Gladiatori).  From here we tried our best to avoid the tourist mobs.  Unsuccessfully because 1) they’re everywhere and 2) they claim all the shady spots.  From here we wandered to station 10 (Teatro Grande) and we had some of our first potluck tour guiding.

What is potluck tour guiding you ask?  This is what happens when you eavesdrop on the NUMEROUS tour guides all spinning similar yarns in the same place.  You may or may not get a full meal out of it but you get a sampling of a lot of different and random things. They may or may not be historically accurate but you get what you pay for and we paid nothing extra.

Station 10 for example has marble seats in some spots.  I overheard a tour guide telling his group that they could rest their bums on the original marble seats of this theater.  I’ve no idea if all the seats were marble covered or just the seats for rich.  Either way, my bum didn’t get to sit on em but I did climb all around the theater because climbing is fun and the views can be awesome.

Via Stabiana

We left Teatro Grande and its cool marble seating (maybe that’s why they used marble!  Marble feels colder than stone…) and made our way to Via Stabiana which runs between between many zones but of note at the moment, between Zone VIII and Zone 1.  Walking along this street we learned 2 more fun facts:

• This street was one of the primary shopping areas of Pompeii.  The experts know this because they had fancy sliding doors to close their shops off at the end of the day.  You can look at the base of the doorways and see the groove where the door slid along.  The stores were on the ground floor and the family lived above the shop.  This was likely an early version of “business in the front and party in the back”.

• The streets were gross.  Lots of livestock, people and carts.  I never did hear if they emptied chamber pots (or similar) into the street as many did back in the day but the tour guides absolutely mentioned the animal pulled carts and the grossness of the streets.  The solution was huge stepping stones at major intersections / crossing points.  Some of them have been made wheelchair friendly by placing metal grates over them (pictured below).  Also, when the Pope visited Pompeii they removed a ton of them and never put them back.

The downfall with potluck history is you don’t get to ask the tour guides “Why?”.  Well, I suppose you could but you didn’t pay them so I doubt they’d answer.  I’m also not interested enough to ask Google so you’re going to have to either trust me or fact check me.  If you choose to fact check, please put the correct answers in the comments below so we can all be more educated.

The Map is a Lie Part 1

The map I’ve linked you to as well as the paper copy I had clearly shows that the water droplets pictured on the map mean fresh water.  I’d been carrying around my empty water bottle for hours so I steered us to the one on the corner of Via Stabiana and Via Dell’Abbondanza.  According to the tour guides this location was the location of an actual well when Pompeii was a bustling city.  This day, however, it was a dry pit without a spigot.

We wandered a bit further down Via Stabiana (near station 17).  I left Chris & Linda to soak up some shade while I checked out the next water location on my map.  This one had a spigot but still no water.  I guess I wasn’t thirsty after all.

The Gambling Hall

Somewhere kinda near Station 5 in Zone IX, Chris put his tour guide hat on and started telling us about the building we were standing in.  Back in the day it was a gambling hall.  Pretty similar to a modern day one but they used the fancy pit to place their bets in.

In another house, we would see a better preserved pit with a pedestal.  He elaborated to tell us that bets were placed on the pedestal prior to the money going into the pit.  I asked if anyone swam in the money like Scrooge McDuck and he didn’t deem that question worthy of an answer.  Further evidence of my you get what you pay for theory.

Other tour guides described similar houses as bakeries and were quick to point out ovens and grain presses.  Some of the more wealthy families had 4!

The Bathhouse

We entered into Section 16 of Zone VII and found ourselves in a bath house (per the paid tour guides).  It was a rather open area so I didn’t get to overhear too much.  I know that there was a pool and separate private areas for the men and women.  There was a lot of hot water in the private areas including a sauna.

Chris was most impressed that they decorated with seashells apparently this trend has been going on for centuries!

The Map is a Lie Part 2

I really wanted water.  The bathhouse and the fountains were just teasing me so I led the way to Zone IX and Casina dell’Aqulla where the map indicates a scenic overlook, food, and water!  It got part of it right.  There were in fact bathrooms and a scenic overlook.  No food.  No water.

Zone I

Zone I seemed largely residential.  The properties were larger and better preserved than much of what we had seen in other zones.  It was clearly the rich district because there was water!  I finally found water where the map said it was!!!

This residential area is where a small-group tour guide or false historian pointed out to his posse that a lot of the Pompeian citizens had penises located at the front entrance of their buildings.  I’ve no idea if this is true but this definitely looks like what he said it was and it was clearly visible from the street rather than located on an interior wall.

Souvenir Shop

I fell behind a little bit in my eagerness to explore all the various nooks and crannies.  Linda kindly waited for me near where they’d left me and Chris was sitting in the shade a few blocks further down the street.  I look on my left and see writing on the wall.  I ask Linda what our fake historian had said about it.  Just as another tourist is about to take a picture of the writing, she responds “Souvenir shop”.  The tourist bursts out laughing.

A bit later in the day, Linda purchased a book about Pompeii.  Turns out there were in fact souvenir shops in Pompeii!  I don’t know if that particular spot was one but we probably passed some during the course of the day.

Zone II

Zones I & II butt up against Zone III which is very much a work in progress excavation wise.  It was neat to see how many layers they were going through but most of Zone III was closed.  Zone II holds Section 5, Anfiteatro, or what I’m going to call the mini-Colosseum.

There was also Section 10, Necropoli di P. Nocera.  Chris and I had visited a cemetery while in Rome and it was interesting to see that tombs really haven’t changed much through the centuries.  There was even a feline guard just like we saw in Rome!

After this, we were as tuckered out as the cat pictured above.  We left via a different “gate” and made our way back to the train station to catch a ride back to Salerno.