Will, Ben and Nevil

Buon giorno di napoli! We had an interesting night a couple of days ago as we approached naples passing many well-dressed young ladies on the way who were providing a seemingly popular local service. Naples is well known for the best pizza in the world, the best buffalo-milk mozzarella and a mafia more industrious than most. It is not the place you want to park a big white british van – it doesnt really blend in. For starters it hasnt got nearly enough scrapes, dents to look napolitan (this may suprise those who have actually seen our van!). Anyway we had been warned not to leave a vehicle in the city at anytime of the day, so for the night we managed to find a beach side car park outside of the city surrounded by heroin-fuelled locals on crime sprees and which required a guard dog, a night watchman and a locked ring fence. When day broke Ben had great fun driving through the city unfortunately receiving no bonus points for hitting any crazy italian motorcyclists. After a hot but interesting visit to pompei we said sad farewells to Lucy and Sam who are heading home soon. Now heading back north beyond rome to meet up with Laura & John near Pisa, Yas in Elba and Tom somewhere as yet undecided!

Rome was amazing, particularly the pantheon. The history of the city was impressive, as was the number of tourists we saw! Quite a shock to hear the dulcet tones of the north london accent after several weeks of hearing mainly italian and french. As well as the tourist sites we couldnt resist that other popular tourist past time, being robbed. Will and Sam were both relieved of their wallets in a busy bus, which, in order to find the police station to report this led to some epic walks around the city thanks to the dubious talents of will and sams map reading! Two days in a hot city hostel away from our lake in bracciano where we left the van was enough though. We headed back after a slightly bemused visit to the st peters basilica, home of everyones favourite religion.