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Escaping the Shadow of Pompeii


Kosmo

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I think there is a similar cluster of waiting skeletons at the base of a shoreside cliff at pompeii. Not labelled and you can barely see as you exit the site from that quite isolated (but connected by walkway) well preserved villa with the many painted rooms. An archeo book told me about it, and i think the least bad view was almost straddling the exit gate or at a restroom door just beyond the gate.

 

Anyway a couple years ago i revisited herculeum and found the walkways improved, and on reflection the drainage ditches were elaborated. But i still think the basic protection from the weather and tourists was in a shambles. In one day a handyman could go around and greatly improve cockeyed tin roofs no longer aligned over frescos, etc. I realize pompeii is in a worse mess, but i think its scale alone makes it more impressive. But herculeum has vast areas not yet dug up.

 

I hope packard the benefactor for this restoration sold his hp stock long ago... the company which really invented silicon valley is in a dozen year death spiral due to horrible management. Norway and other places with gender mandates for corp leaders should take note of the catastrophe that ensued when hewlett-packard was the first big company to overlook experience and track record for a female placeholder. Not a reasonable one, like several you see at the helms today, but someone who bled the company in half during a good economy. And it continued to replace ceos with more "inclusive" but tech ignorant male and female characters, and now the employees, the shareholders, and the legacy face impending extinction.

Edited by caesar novus
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Pompeii was a mess, this summer. Streets were closed and facades of houses badly shored.

To walk around in the city was only to experience the idea of everly day life in a roman city.

 

Herculaneum was a relieve! And less touristic in the summertime. No thanks to Italian bureaucracy.

 

But, if you really want to visit a well preserved huge house, I recommend the villas at Oplontis

(http://oplontisproject.org/) nearby Pompeii. What a marvellous job! Also with help from abroad.

 

When you visit the Naples area, I suggest to visit the three of them in this order. Next thing to

do is to visit the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli.

And afterwards, take a pizza and read Robert Harris "Pompeii", while nipping your limoncello('s).

 

I like the Italians a lot, but preserving their roman heritage, they obviously need a lot of help.

 

Jeroen H de Lange,

Amsterdam

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But, if you really want to visit a well preserved huge house, I recommend the villas at Oplontis

(http://oplontisproject.org/) nearby Pompeii. What a marvellous job! Also with help from abroad.

 

I can only echo that sentiment. Oplonits,and especially the Villa Poppaea, have some stunning levels of preservation (sadly, on a much, much smaller site).

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I agree with the two posts above, Oplontis is a must see! And a word of advice to that. A lot of people want to visit Stabia, which I did 2011. It is a (number of) site(s) but you have really seen everything it has to offer just by visiting Oplontis. Not to mention that it is exceedingly difficult to get to Stabia so you'll probably end up just looking for it a whole day.

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I agree with the two posts above, Oplontis is a must see! And a word of advice to that. A lot of people want to visit Stabia, which I did 2011. It is a (number of) site(s) but you have really seen everything it has to offer just by visiting Oplontis. Not to mention that it is exceedingly difficult to get to Stabia so you'll probably end up just looking for it a whole day.

 

You're right Klingan, it was really a wild safari-trip to get to Villa Arianna and Villa San Marco. From our campsite in Sorrento (pretty nice view at the Vesuvio) it should have been about 15 minutes to get there,

but I found myself driving around in circles at 40

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You're right Klingan, it was really a wild safari-trip to get to Villa Arianna and Villa San Marco. From our campsite in Sorrento (pretty nice view at the Vesuvio) it should have been about 15 minutes to get there,

but I found myself driving around in circles at 40

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