Cruise Day 5: Naples/Sorrento/Capri

Well, Day 5 arrived and very much like Meryl Streep circa 1985, we were "Out of Africa"!! LOL....and our next stop, as you can see from the day's magnet, was Naples----or at least that was the port at which the ship docked.  In actuality, Adventures by Disney and other (and better) plans than for us to just stay there near the port.  Instead we spent the morning part of our day in the town/region of Sorrento (and, very appropriate to our magnet, our activities for the day did involve pizza) and then the afternoon on the island of Capri.

It was an early day again....UGH!  Of course, to be honest...at this point on vacation any day that starts with me getting up before 9am is starting to feel "early" to me...and with our current itineraries, it seems I am having to get up each morning anywhere between 6am and 6:45am each day (and for those of you at home, you have probably done the math and realize that's actually earlier than I get up for WORK!!!------tell me how on earth did I end up on a vacation with earlier mornings and longer days than my job!?!? LOL)  Anyhow....an early day...and a relatively long one....with a lot of sun....so by the end of the day, we were really feeling it----but it was an amazing day.  It's hard to say that any day is "my favorite" so far on this trip since we've done so many amazing things and been so many amazing places already.....but this day was a good one and one of, if not THE, best (so far)!

To give you a sense of how early we were up on this morning, here is a picture of the sun RISING in Naples that morning---and let's be very clear that sunrise and I don't often see each other!!

After getting off the boat, we headed off to our motor coaches.  On all our previous days up to that point, the whole group was able to fit onto one large coach (bus) for our tours.  On this day, however, they informed us that we had to split into two groups to get onto smaller buses/coaches because the roads were too small and narrow and winding for a large vehicle.  I should interrupt my own train of thought here and add that this announcement was more than a little bit disconcerting because---although i haven't written much about it so far in these blog posts----the roads we had been traveling on since this cruise started were already insanely narrow and winding.  In fact, I think it was an absolute miracle that we emerged unscathed at the end of each day because we were driving on roads there there were literally INCHES between our vehicle and surrounding obstacles like other cars, trucks and buses that were passing in the opposite direction (often on roads that were two way but didn't seem wide enough to be a one way alley!)...or cars parked along the side of the road....or in some cases even the buildings along the road (like if someone had opened a door outward towards the street our bus would have taken it clear off! LOL).  So to hear that the roads we'd already experienced were the WIDE ones was a little scary....but as nuts as the roads in the Mediterranean had been so far (you couldn't pay me enough to try to drive in even ONE of the countries or ports we'd visited thus far)....the only thing more amazing had been the skill of our drivers.  So again-----we had faith, trust and pixie dust that we'd make it through.....and so our coaches were off (each with their own tour guide).

Here's the quick synopsis of the day before we get into the real details (you know-----culture/history, experiences, & sights/scenery).  We took a very scenic drive from the port to a small farm in the hills of Sorrento that has been run by the same small family for generations.  Here we learned about how their farm works---producing olives and olive oil, growing lemons and other citrus and grapes, making their own wine, growing their own livestock to generate their own meats and cheeses----and finishing up by making our own wood fired pizzas for lunch.  After our time on the farm, we hopped back in our coaches and headed off to a ferry boat that took us to the island of Capri.  One word: stunning.  On Capri we got to go on a private boat ride around the coastline of the island and see the elaborate landscape from the water and then we anchored the boat and jumped off for a relaxing and refreshing swim in the Mediterranean.  This all wrapped up with a little shopping in Capri before we returned to the ship for our dinner and evening activities.

So, here's the more detailed lowdown on our Adventures by Disney visit to Naples/Sorrento/Capri....

History/Culture

OK, once again I am not going to have a great deal to write here about what we learned about the history and culture of this region....but I want to be very clear that it was NOT because our tour guides weren't amazingly well informed and tried to share the information with us.  Rather it's much more that I just don't recall everything they said----partly because I'm writing this 5 days after the fact and partly because even while they were talking, I was so distracted and enthralled with how beautiful our drive was that I was only able to half pay attention! LOL   All that said, however, we did certainly learn a little bit about the region....one thing that certainly sticks out is the area's relationship with Mount Vesuvius----which our guide told us was and still is the most dangerous volcano in all of Europe.  Vesuvius is the volcano that wiped out the ancient city of Pompeii.  Unfortunately, our tour did not include a visit to Pompeii because there just wasn't time. (Note:  I don't really have any complaints about our Adventures by Disney experience....but during the 10 days were on this cruise and with this tour there are a handful of things we were not able to do that I wish we could have:  Pompeii is one of them.)  We did drive PAST Pompeii, however, and could see some of the main structures remaining high up on the hilltop from the highway.  Our guide gave us a very detailed history of both Pompeii and the volcano.  Here is one of the better pictures of Mt. Vesuvius that we took (which could also easily go into the Scenery section of this blog post...and may well be seen there, too!):

In addition to the history lesson about Mt. Vesuvius, we also learned a great deal about the agricultural history of the region from both our guide and from the family working the farm where we spent the bulk of our morning and early afternoon.  We learned about the process of growing and harvesting olives.  A few fun facts:  to harvest olives in this region, which grown on trees, there are nets suspended between all the trees and at harvest time the nets are opened up beneath the trees and the olives fall (or are shaken) out of the trees into the nets to be collected.  Additionally----I learned a fact about olives (which I don't even eat):  black and green olives come off the same tree....they are not different kinds of olive....they are, according to our guide, different levels of RIPENESS of the same olives....and we got the chance to see the old world "machinery" used to create extra virgin olive oil.  Here are some pictures of our guide at the farm (one of the women who actually works the farm herself along with 7 or 8 of her family members) explaining about the production of olives and olive oil.  The first is a picture of the large stone machine they used to crush the olives to extract the oil and the second is a picture a large white filter (made out of what appeared to be wicker) onto which they would pile the crushed olives and the oil would then filter through it for collection:

Seeing the working of the farm was very interesting, as well, because it was a view into a farming culture that was very different than what we're exposed to in the United States.  When I think of "farm" I envision the beginning of "The Wizard of Oz"-----big open fields out in Kansas where there are flat open spaces of land with neat rows of well manicured and plowed crop growing and large fenced-in fields for livestock to roam around.  This was NOTHING like this little Italian farm which was, like much of the rest of the region in which it is situated, quite literally built into the side of a mountain!  The entire farm, which is quite large for the area exist on the side of a hill and all the farming, produce growing and caring for livestock (as well as the multiple houses in which all the members of the farming family live) are settled onto a series of ascending and descending terraces.  It was quite impressive!

While Mt. Vesuvius and the Sorrento farm both touch on either experience(s) and/or scenery, as well....I think they also count as places where I walked away having learned something more about this part of the world I had never before visited----and hence, increased my understanding (at least a little) of the culture and history of the region.

Experience(s)

Our main experience of the day was on the Sorrento farm....and involved really two items: the making of mozzarella cheese and the making of pizza.  (Note:  We did have a boating and swimming experience in Capri, as well, but that was more just relaxing in the picturesque beauty of Capri...and so I'll include some pictures of that in the "sights/scenery" section in just a bit----but also, we have very limited images right now of that part of our day because the battery in our camera died. *frown*  Our friends Trisha & Ben, who were also on the Adventures by Disney with us, took a lot of pictures for us, but we will not be getting those until the end of the vacation so I'll have to post them a little later....check back).

So, at the farm....we got a great tour, met our hosts, visited with their extensive menagerie of animals (some of which were kept for food----either for milk or eggs or meat and others were just kept as pets), and had a demonstration of the production of olive oil, mozzarella cheese and pizzas.  The mozzarella cheese was interesting as they showed us the process of turning cheese curd in the the delicious topping that pizza lovers all around the world have become so familiar with.  Here are some images of one of the men (I believe they said his name was John Battista----don't ask me how/why I remember that LOL) working on mozzarella:

The next fun experience we had was making our own pizza.  The same man who showed us how they make their own mozzarella cheese also did our pizza demonstration for us.  He shaped his pizza dough, spread on some sauce and cheese, slid it into a wood fired oven (which, after doing some basic math to convert centigrade to farenheit, we determined was more than 700 degrees inside!!) and the pizzas cooked in about 2 minutes each!!  Once he had demonstrated the how-to of correctly constructing your own personal pizza....we each got to make our own lunch!  Here are some pics of Jason and I as we went through the various steps.....

Striking a pose in our paper "chef" hats and aprons:

Working our ball of pizza dough into a flat round(ish) shape on a floured counter:

Tossing our dough into the air for delicious pizza with a flair!!  (And I don't feel bad saying that Jason and I were two of the best dough-tossers in the group....so if we ever need a second career in life-----Pizza Hut here we come!! LOL):

Adding toppings----fresh tomato sauce, oregano, fresh mozzarella cheese (all products produced right there on the farm!):

Our pizzas cooking in the oven (mine is closest to door of the oven and Jason's is the farthest one in):

Adding some fresh basil (also grown right on the farm) to the pizzas:

Our finished pizzas----mine is on the right and Jason's is on the left....and in the first picture we're holding our own pizzas obviously:

The pizzas were delicious....and making them was really, REALLY fun.  This was, again, an example of something we probably would never have had the chance to do (at least not in that way) without Adventures by Disney!  We loved it!

After finishing up the pizza lunch, they weren't done with us yet.  They had just two more quick things to share with us-----a tasting of a liquor that they make right there on the farm with fresh lemons called "Limoncello" (and that if you didn't feel like drinking it to get drunk you could probably also use it to remove nail polish or to thin paint! LOL) and they showed us down to their gift shop where you could buy some of the various products they produce right there on the farm including bottled olive oils, different flavors of liqueurs and an assortment of jams and marmalades.  We decided to buy a small jar of fig jelly as a memento of the day we spent on this lovely littel farm in Sorrento, Italy.  Here is a pic of our "Marmalleta di Fichi" from Fondo Galatea (which I am almost sure was the name of the farm): 

As I mentioned earlier, following the morning and early afternoon at the farm, we hopped back on our coaches and drove to catch a DIFFERENT set of smaller coaches (because, remarkably...YOU GUESSED IT....we needed even smaller vehicles to get down the roads to the ferry landing!!-----I swear by this point I felt like we might all be piling into a clown car before we the day was over! LOL).  Then we caught a ferry that took us to the posh island of Capri!  Capri wasn't so much an "experience" or activity spot for the day as much as it was a sightseeing one (but boy was it a BEAUTIFUL sight seeing stop!!)...so I'll talk more about that in our next section....

Sights/Scenery:

Before I move on to talking about the scenery, I'll just a few of the sights we saw at the farm including some of their gardens, produce and livestock (& flowers):

Those images, and the farm, was lovely and cute (you know I love animals!! LOL).....butCapri (actually the entire Naples-Sorrento-Capri area, to be honest) is simply gorgeous!  In the same way that I mentioned that the farm we visited is kind of built into the side of hills and mountains-----so is the entire surrounding area.  From the coastline you can see the mountains  growing up out of the ocean with buildings and cities and villages built right into both the coastline AND the landscape and sides of the mountains.  It's truly stunning.  (It's somewhat ironic to see so much built up into the foot of the mountains here----when it's established that one of the main mountains is the "most dangerous volcanoes in Europe"....but it's still stunning.   Here are just a few of the picturesque views we saw as we drove and/or sailed around Naples and the island of Capri:

Following this amazing day in port, we got back on the ship and got ready for dinner.  Waiting for our return to our cabin was our towel animal for the day:

Tonight's ties for dinner were our Toy Story ties.....which worked out perfectly because when we got downstairs, they were taking pictures with Woody and Jessie from the Toy Story films (and we hadn't even known about it when we selected the ties!).  Here's a picture:

I know I usually close with our ties and towel animals...but I think it would only be appropriate to close our post about the beautiful port of Naples with a shot Jason took of the sunset as we were leaving port:

I know I usually close with our ties and towel animals...but I think it would only be appropriate to close our post about the beautiful port of Naples with a shot Jason took of the sunset as we were leaving port:

See you all tomorrow in Rome!!!