HERCULANEUM, A ROMAN LESSON IN URBAN PLANNING

Musings of The Grandma...

There are places you visit for their monuments. There are places you visit for their beauty. And then there are places that make you look at the world around you differently. Herculaneum is one of them.

I first visited the ancient city many years ago, during my Erasmus years in Napoli. I returned on one of my trips with my friend Claire Fontaine, who has accompanied The Grandma on many of her adventures.

That particular visit began at Mount Vesuvius. By the time we came down from the volcano, it was already late afternoon. We decided to visit Herculaneum, assuming that the archaeological site would still be open. It wasn't. We had arrived just as it was closing.

There was no internet, no mobile phone, no online booking system and no way of checking opening hours at the touch of a screen. We simply stood there, rather disappointed, and explained to the man at the entrance that we had come from Barcelona and had no idea whether we would ever have another opportunity to return. He looked at us. Then he let us in. Not officially, not really. He told us that he had to finish closing the site, but that we could spend a few minutes looking from the entrance and take as many photographs as we wanted. We had film cameras with us, and after a long day at Vesuvius we had almost forgotten that we were carrying them. So we did something very different from what we would do today. We simply looked. We stood there and looked at Herculaneum. And I still remember that view. I can close my eyes even now and see the ancient city spread out below us.

From that elevated position, something caught our attention. The streets. We could identify the two fundamental directions of Roman urban planning: the cardines, running across the city, and the decumani, running in the other direction. The regularity of the plan was extraordinary.

The Archaeological Park itself describes Herculaneum's urban layout as remarkably regular, with the decumani running parallel to the coastline and the cardines perpendicular to them, defining rectangular residential blocks. We mentioned this to the man who had let us in. He clearly had not expected that observation. And then something even better happened. He asked us: "Are you in a hurry?" We told him that we had until the last Circumvesuviana train. So instead of spending fifteen minutes there, we spent a couple of hours. That evening became one of those encounters that you remember for decades. We talked about Roman cities. About streets. About orientation. About the relationship between public and private space. About how people moved through a city. About why a city is not simply a collection of buildings, but a system designed around the movement and needs of human beings. And, because we were in Napoli, the conversation somehow also included music. There were wonderful sfogliatellas, delicious ice cream and an unforgettable coffee.

It was not the visit we had planned. It was infinitely better.

The man who had been supposed to close the archaeological site had given us something much more valuable than a few extra minutes inside it. He had given us his time. I don't even know whether he is still with us. He must surely be retired by now. But I have never forgotten him. And this post is, in a way, my small tribute to him.

There is another reason why Herculaneum has always fascinated me. I come from Barcelona. And if you live in Barcelona, you live inside one of the most recognisable urban grids in Europe. The Eixample, designed by Ildefons Cerdà in the nineteenth century, was conceived as a rational extension of the city, based on a regular network of streets and blocks. Cerdà's plan was approved in 1859, and the expansion began after Barcelona's medieval walls were finally demolished.

The standard Eixample block measures approximately 133 metres by 133 metres, while the streets were designed to be around 20 metres wide. The famous chamfered corners were another characteristic element of Cerdà's design.

Of course, Herculaneum and Barcelona are not the same thing. They were separated by almost two thousand years. Cerdà did not simply copy a Roman city. But standing in Herculaneum and looking at its streets, it is impossible for someone from Barcelona not to recognise something familiar. The idea that a city can be planned rather than allowed to grow entirely at random. The idea that streets create relationships between buildings. That orientation matters. That movement matters. That public space matters. That the shape of a city influences the lives of the people who inhabit it.

And suddenly the Roman cardo and decumanus stop being archaeological vocabulary. They become something much more immediate. They become urban language. This is perhaps what makes Herculaneum so extraordinary. The archaeological remains do not merely tell us where people lived. They allow us to reconstruct, with remarkable detail, how they lived.

The site preserves residential and commercial areas, workshops, baths, public buildings and houses with gardens and terraces. The Archaeological Park emphasises precisely this extraordinary ability to reconstruct everyday life at a particular moment in the ancient world. And that is what I find most fascinating. Not the ruins themselves. The people who once walked between them. Someone opening a shop in the morning. Someone carrying food home. Children running through a street. Someone going to the baths. Someone meeting a friend. Someone complaining about the heat. Someone falling in love. Someone making plans for the following day.

People who had no idea that almost two thousand years later, someone would stand above their streets and try to imagine them. The city that disappeared Herculaneum, like Pompeii, was overwhelmed by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. But its fate was different. The volcanic material that buried the city preserved an extraordinary amount of organic material and architectural detail, giving archaeologists an exceptional window into Roman daily life. And there is something deeply moving about that. Because preservation is a strange thing. We celebrate it as archaeologists and historians. We marvel at the mosaics, the wooden objects, the houses, the streets and the inscriptions. But behind every preserved object there was once a living person. Every doorway was someone's doorway. Every street was someone's route home. Every house contained somebody's life.

That is why I find it difficult to look at Herculaneum simply as an archaeological site. It was a city. And cities are made of people.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if that man had simply told us: "Sorry. We're closed." We would have gone away. We would probably have taken the train back to Napoli. And Herculaneum would have remained another archaeological site we had visited. Instead, he opened a door that was already supposed to be closed. He gave two young women from Barcelona a little of his time. And, without knowing it, he gave us a lesson that has stayed with me for decades. About Roman urbanism. About cities. About curiosity. And perhaps, above all, about generosity.

I don't remember his name. But I remember the city he helped us see. And whenever I walk through Barcelona, whenever I cross one of the long streets of the Eixample and look down the regular lines of buildings, I sometimes think about that evening in Herculaneum.

Two cities. Two very different worlds. Two very different moments in history. And between them, an idea that has survived for thousands of years: A city is not only the place where we live. It is the way we organise our lives together. And somewhere in Herculaneum, beneath the streets and houses that Vesuvius buried, there is still the trace of a city that knew that very well.

More information: Herculaneum

 

The extraordinary greatness of the Roman Empire 
manifests itself above all in three things: 
the aqueducts, the paved roads, 

and the construction of the drains.

Dionysius of Halicarnassus

POMPEII. THE CITY OF PEOPLE, THE VOICES ON THE WALLS

Musings of The Grandma...

There are places in the world where history feels distant. You look at a ruin, read a date, admire a column and try to imagine the people who once lived there. And then there is Pompeii. At Pompeii, history does not feel distant. It feels uncomfortably close.

You can walk along its streets and see the houses where people lived, the shops where they worked, the bakeries where bread was made, the places where food and wine were sold, the fountains where water was collected and the walls where ordinary people wrote messages, jokes, political slogans and fragments of their lives.

You can almost imagine someone opening a door. Someone going to work. Someone buying bread. Someone arguing with a neighbour. Someone falling in love. Someone worrying about money. Someone feeding an animal. Someone planning what they would do the following morning. Except there was no following morning.

In AD 79, the eruption of Mount Vesuvius brought an abrupt end to the lives of many of the inhabitants of Pompeii. Ash, pumice and volcanic material buried the city, preserving an extraordinary amount of evidence of everyday life. The result is one of archaeology's most extraordinary paradoxes: a city survived because its inhabitants did not.

That is what makes Pompeii so difficult for me. It is beautiful. It is fascinating. It is extraordinarily important. But it is also deeply sad.

It is tempting to think of Pompeii as an enormous archaeological museum without a roof. But it wasn't a museum. It was a city. People lived there. They worked there. They cooked, traded, worshipped, complained, celebrated and raised families there. And archaeology allows us to reconstruct some of those lives from surprisingly ordinary things. A cooking pot. A lamp. A wine amphora. A piece of furniture. A shop counter. A child's object. A painted wall. A bakery. A laundry. A stable. A garden. Even a basket whose shape was preserved in the volcanic material.

The Archaeological Park's collections contain tens of thousands of objects from Pompeii and its surroundings, documenting religion, politics, commerce, craftsmanship and, above all, the small details of daily life. And perhaps that is what makes the city so extraordinary. The grand buildings tell us about power. The ordinary objects tell us about people.

Pompeii was not inhabited exclusively by wealthy Romans living in magnificent houses. There were rich people, certainly. Some houses were enormous and lavishly decorated. The largest domus could cover thousands of square metres, with atriums, gardens, dining rooms and servants' quarters. But alongside those houses existed another Pompeii. The Pompeii of bakers. Shopkeepers. Craftspeople. Farmers. Launderers. Merchants. Cooks. Slaves. Freed people. Children. Women. Labourers. People whose names have disappeared but whose work has not.

One of the most evocative places is the thermopolium, essentially an ancient establishment selling hot food and drinks. Pompeii had dozens of them. Their counters contained large vessels built into the masonry where food and beverages were stored. Imagine walking into one of those places almost two thousand years ago. You were not visiting an archaeological site. You were simply hungry. You bought something to eat. You drank something. You paid. You left.

And now, nearly twenty centuries later, archaeologists are reconstructing that tiny moment of your life. That is Pompeii.

Sometimes we talk about Pompeii as though only humans lived there. They didn't. Animals were part of the city's economy and daily life too. Horses, donkeys and other working animals were used for transport and labour. Dogs lived alongside humans. Animals were kept in stables and were part of agricultural and commercial activities.

Recent archaeological work continues to reveal their stories. At Civita Giuliana, just outside the main city, archaeologists discovered a stable containing equine remains, including a horse whose shape could be reconstructed through the plaster-cast technique. The animal had been found beside a wooden trough whose form was also preserved.

And in 2026, new excavations in the bakery of the Insula of the Chaste Lovers revealed the remains of two more large herbivores. These discoveries matter because they remind us that Pompeii was not simply a human settlement. It was an ecosystem. A place where people, animals, plants, food, work and commerce were interconnected.

One of the things I love most about Pompeii is that its inhabitants left their voices behind. Not only the voices of emperors, politicians or wealthy citizens. Ordinary voices. People wrote on walls. Some inscriptions were political. Some were advertisements. Some were declarations of affection. Some were jokes. Some were insults. Some were simply people making sure that somebody knew they had been there. In a strange way, those graffiti make Pompeii feel more modern than many other ancient cities. Because suddenly the people who lived there stop being "the Romans". They become individuals. People with opinions. People with friends. People with enemies. People with a sense of humour. People who wanted to be heard.

I first arrived in Napoli in 1994 as an Erasmus student. It was a very different Erasmus from the one students know today. My university residence was paid for, meals at the university mensa were covered and I had a university transport pass. That gave me the possibility of doing something I really wanted: discovering Campania beyond the classroom.

During the academic year I studied. During the summer, I stayed in Napoli and tried to make myself useful. I volunteered with the Italian Red Cross, helping with social work at a time when the wars in the Balkans were bringing many displaced people to Napoli. And I also offered my help at Pompeii.

Whenever I accompanied visitors, I used to tell them something else. Pompeii is extraordinary. But please, if you have the opportunity, go to Herculaneum. And go to Paestum. Both are extraordinary archaeological treasures, and both can easily disappear beneath Pompeii's enormous shadow. Pompeii is so famous that it sometimes makes everything around it look smaller. It isn't.

Campania is an enormous archaeological puzzle, and Pompeii is only one of its most spectacular pieces. And the puzzle is still being assembled. Excavations continue. New rooms appear. New objects are studied. Old interpretations are questioned. New technologies allow researchers to reconstruct things that seemed lost forever. The Archaeological Park itself describes current research as an ongoing process: Pompeii is still being excavated, documented and interpreted. We are not finished with Pompeii. Not even close.

There is something I feel every time I return to Pompeii. It is difficult to explain. Walking through those streets, I don't only think about archaeology. I think about death. Not in a sensationalistic way. Not because of the plaster casts. Not because of the volcano. I think about the people. The people who went to bed. The people who were working. The people who were looking after their children. The people who were eating. The people who were frightened. The people who perhaps thought they would survive. And the people who didn't.

It reminds me of other places where history has left behind an uncomfortable silence. Flanders. Normandy. Places where thousands upon thousands of human lives disappeared into wars that we now reduce to dates, battles and arrows on maps. Or places much closer to home. The Fossar de les Moreres. The Born. The Camp de la Bota. The Terres de l'Ebre. Places where human beings died and where memory becomes an act of respect. Because ruins are never just stones. A battlefield is never just a landscape. An archaeological site is never just an excavation. Behind every fragment there was somebody who once had a life. Somebody who had a name. Somebody who was loved. Somebody who expected to see another morning.

That is why I don't like the idea of Pompeii simply as a "city frozen in time". It is more complicated than that. Pompeii is a city interrupted. A city whose people were suddenly removed from the future they were expecting to have. And perhaps our responsibility, nearly two thousand years later, is not simply to admire what survived. It is to remember those who did not. To study them. To understand them. To give them back, as far as archaeology allows, their ordinary lives. Their work. Their families. Their fears. Their humour. Their animals. Their food. Their homes. Their voices. Their dignity.

Because the greatest treasure Pompeii has given us is not a fresco, a villa or a perfectly preserved street. It is the possibility of knowing that these people existed. And as long as we remember them, they are not completely lost. Pompeii is not only about the end of a city. It is about the persistence of human memory. And perhaps that is why, after all these years, I still find it impossible to walk through Pompeii without feeling my heart stop for a moment.

The volcano stopped their lives, but it did not stop their stories.

More information: History Extra

 Iam dies alibi, illic nox omnibus 

noctibus nigrior densiorque. 
Tenebrae rursus, cinis rursus, multus et gravis.

Elsewhere it was day; there, night 
-blacker and denser than any night. 
Darkness again. Ash again. Much and heavy.

Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus

'IO PARTO, ADIO. TORNA A SURRIENTO, FAMME CAMPÀ...'

Musings of The Grandma...

There are places you visit because they are beautiful. And then there are places that somehow make you want to return before you have even left. Surriento belongs to the second category. 

Perched dramatically above the Bay of Napoli, on a coastline carved into cliffs and terraces, Surriento seems to have been designed specifically to make human beings stop walking, look at the sea and say: Wow. 

And then, almost inevitably, someone starts singing. Torna a Surriento…

Because in Surriento, it is almost impossible not to think of that famous Neapolitan song. But Sorrento is much more than a beautiful view. It is history, music, villas, gardens, cliffs, citrus trees, grand hotels, narrow roads and the Mediterranean in almost every direction. And, in my case, it is also the memory of being hit by a wave of dirty rainwater thrown at us by a luxury car. But let me start at the beginning.

Surriento occupies a spectacular position on the Surriento Peninsula, overlooking the Bay of Napoli. The geography is responsible for much of its character. The town sits on a high plateau above steep cliffs, while the coastline below drops dramatically towards the Tyrrhenian Sea. Roads wind down towards the water, often through slopes and bends that seem to have been designed to test both drivers and passengers. The reward is extraordinary.

From Surriento, the panorama opens towards the Bay of Napoli, Mount Vesuvius and the islands scattered across the horizon. It is one of those landscapes where the sea does not simply form the background. You see it between buildings, beneath terraces, beyond gardens and at the end of streets. And then there are the villas.

Some of Surriento's historic residences and hotels reveal just how long this coastline has attracted wealthy travellers, aristocrats and people looking for somewhere extraordinarily beautiful to live or spend their holidays. Surriento became an important destination during the era of the Grand Tour, when European aristocrats, artists and intellectuals travelled through Italy in search of classical culture, landscapes and inspiration. It is not difficult to understand why they stopped here.

Even today, you can look at the view and understand immediately. And then there are the lemons. Huge Surriento lemons. They seem almost ridiculously large compared with the lemons you normally find elsewhere. Citrus cultivation has been deeply connected with the landscape and economy of the Sorrento Peninsula for centuries, and the local lemon has become one of the symbols of the area. You find lemons in gardens, markets, restaurants, desserts, drinks and, of course, limoncello. Sorrento doesn't merely grow lemons. It has turned the lemon into part of its identity. And somehow, against that blue Mediterranean background, everything tastes even more intensely Mediterranean.

Among Surriento's historic hotels, the Grand Hotel Excelsior Vittoria occupies a particularly fascinating place. The hotel was founded in 1834 and has remained in the hands of the Fiorentino family for five generations. Over its long history, it welcomed an extraordinary list of guests, including artists, politicians, royalty and musicians. One of them was Errico Caruso. The great Italian tenor stayed at the hotel, and his connection with Sorrento became part of the hotel's history. Today, the hotel even has a suite bearing his name. And this is where Surriento and music become almost inseparable. Because once you are surrounded by that landscape, it is very difficult not to understand why someone would write a song asking Surriento to come back.

Torna a Surriento means 'Come back to Sorrento'. The song was written by the brothers Ernesto and Giambattista De Curtis, and became one of the most famous songs of the Neapolitan tradition. It was subsequently performed by some of the greatest voices of the twentieth century, including Enrico Caruso.

There is a fascinating story surrounding its creation and the visit of Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Zanardelli to Sorrento in 1902. The song became associated with the hope that the politician would help improve the town's infrastructure and return to enjoy its beauty. The precise history of the song's composition is more complicated than the popular legend suggests, but its connection with Surriento became permanent.

And honestly? You don't need to know any of that to understand the song. You only have to stand in Surriento. Look at the cliffs. Look at the sea. Look at Vesuvius in the distance. Listen to the voices around you. And suddenly the title makes perfect sense. Come back to Surriento. The funny thing is that Surriento doesn't really need to ask. You are already thinking about coming back.

I have visited Surriento twice. The first time, the region was experiencing a heatwave. Not the pleasant Mediterranean kind of warmth. The other kind. The kind that makes you feel as though the air itself has forgotten how to move. It was suffocating. The second time, I returned with Claire Fontaine, a friend who accompanies The Grandma on many of her travels. And Surriento had apparently decided that one weather extreme was not enough. We were hit by one of those extraordinary August thunderstorms that arrive suddenly and make you feel as if the sky is collapsing on top of you. One minute everything was fine. The next minute, the heavens opened. We had absolutely nothing to protect ourselves from the rain. No umbrellas. No raincoats. Nothing. We were walking down one of those winding roads that descend towards the sea, trying to avoid puddles and, more importantly, trying not to fall. And then we saw it. A shelter. Four metres away. We were almost saved. Almost. At precisely that moment, a high-end car came down the road. It skidded right in front of us. And the tyres sent an enormous wave of water -more than a metre high, or at least that is how it felt- straight over us. We were completely soaked. And dirty. The car stopped. For one glorious second, I thought the driver might actually apologise. Instead, he reversed. He looked at us. He laughed. And drove away. I have never forgotten that face. Or that car. Or the feeling of standing there, drenched from head to toe, looking at each other and wondering whether to laugh or commit a crime. So now, whenever I hear Torna a Surriento, there is a small part of my brain that remembers the magnificent cliffs, the Mediterranean, the lemons, the villas and the beautiful Surriento...

...and another part that remembers that idiot in the expensive car.

Perhaps this is what travelling really is. Beautiful landscapes mixed with completely ridiculous memories. And yet, I would go back tomorrow. That is the strange thing about Surriento. Even after the heatwave. Even after the thunderstorm. Even after being hit by a metre-high wall of dirty water. I would return. Tomorrow. Without hesitation. Because Surriento has something that photographs cannot quite capture. It is not only the cliffs. It is not only the villas. It is not only the gardens or the lemons. It is the feeling of being somewhere suspended between land and sea, between history and the present, between the enormous landscape of the Bay of Napoli and the tiny details of everyday Mediterranean life. It is the sound of a song that has been asking people to return for more than a century. It is the smell of citrus. The colour of the sea. The impossible roads. The gardens hanging above the cliffs. The memory of Caruso. The sound of Neapolitan voices. And, sometimes, an August storm that arrives without warning. Surriento is not perfect. Perhaps that is precisely why I love it. Because the places we remember most vividly are rarely the ones where everything went according to plan.

They are the places where something happened. Something unexpected. Something ridiculous. Something beautiful. Something that stays with you. And Surriento stayed with me. I haven't even finished writing this, and I already want to go back. Torna a Surriento. Come back to Surriento. I think I will.

More information: Errico Caruso, Neapolitan Language in Opera

Ma num mme lassà
Non darme sto tormiento
Torna a Surriento
Famme campà.

But do not leave me,
Do not cause me this torment;
Return to Sorrento,
Let me live.

 Ernesto and Giambattista De Curtis

CAPRI, WALKING BETWEEN TIBERIUS AND AUGUSTUS

Musings of The Grandma... 

There are words that carry history inside them. In Catalan, we have a wonderfully expressive word: tiberi -a sumptuous, abundant feast. We say fer un bon tiberi, literally, to have a good Tiberius.

The word is probably an allusion to the Roman emperor Tiberius, whose reputation for excess, debauchery and cruelty became legendary. And this is where language becomes fascinating: sometimes we use an expression every day without having the slightest idea that, hidden inside it, there is an emperor, an island and two thousand years of stories.

On Capri, Tiberius is everywhere. The emperor spent the final years of his reign on the island, where he built a series of magnificent villas, the most famous being Villa Jovis, perched high above the sea.

But the idyllic landscape has a darker memory. Ancient writers, particularly Suetonius, portrayed Capri as a place of cruelty and excess. He tells us that condemned prisoners were thrown from a cliff into the sea after being tortured. Other, even more sensational stories surrounded Tiberius and his private life -stories that historians today treat with considerable caution.

Perhaps that is one of the most fascinating things about history: the truth, the rumour and the legend eventually become entangled.

And somewhere in Catalunya, every time we say Avui farem un bon tiberi, we are unknowingly keeping a tiny linguistic souvenir of Tiberius alive. A feast. An emperor. An island. And a word that has survived for two thousand years. Not bad for a piece of vocabulary.

Today Capri is one of the world's best-known tourist destinations. It has luxury hotels, designer shops, famous restaurants, celebrities and all the glamour that has accumulated around the island during the last century. But underneath that image is something much older. There is prehistoric human presence. Greek settlement. Roman imperial architecture. Medieval history. Monasteries. Fortifications. Fishing traditions. Lemon groves. Volcanic and tectonic landscapes. Caves and cliffs. And thousands of years of people looking at the same sea and deciding that this was a place worth staying.

Capri is beautiful, certainly. But beauty is only the beginning. Capri is an island where geology became landscape, landscape became mythology, mythology became history, and history became memory. And perhaps that is why, even after leaving it, the island stays with you. For me, it is the smell of the Mediterranean. The enormous lemons. The Faraglioni. The ruins of Villa Jovis. The light. And somewhere in the background, the sound of a group of very determined Neapolitans shouting at a ferry crew:

“Aspettate!” (Wait!)

Luckily, they did. And we made it back to Napoli. Just.

We had spent the whole day trying to see as much of Capri as possible: the giant lemons, the funicular, Anacapri, the Roman ruins and the spectacular views. We simply forgot one small detail: the time. When we finally realised that our ferry back to Napoli was about to leave, we ran towards the harbour at full speed. A group of people started shouting at a crew member, asking them to lower the boarding ramp. Somehow, they waited. We sprinted like Olympic athletes and made it aboard the last ferry. Otherwise, we would have spent the night on Capri -which, admittedly, would not have been the worst place in the world to get stranded.

We spent only one day on Capri, but we tried to fit an entire island into it. Perhaps that is why we almost missed the ferry. Yet what I remember most is not any single monument. It is the Mediterranean itself: the light, the sea, the lemons, the narrow roads, the boats, the ancient stones and the extraordinary feeling that history was everywhere.

We were young and wonderfully unprepared for the world. There were no smartphones, no Google Maps, no WhatsApp and no way of knowing when the next ferry would leave. We didn't even know the phone number of our university residence. If we missed that ferry, there was no app to find us a room, no message to tell the university where we were and no GPS to guide us anywhere. So we ran.

Today, we would probably be wiser. Or at least slower. We would simply accept that we were spending the night in Capri and find somewhere to sleep -even if it meant waiting at the harbour until morning.

But perhaps that is what made travelling in those days so memorable. We had fewer tools, but we depended much more on people. A group of complete strangers shouted at the ferry crew and helped us get on board. They didn't know us. They simply saw two young people running desperately towards a departing ferry and decided that we should not miss it.

Thirty years later, technology can solve almost everything in minutes. But sometimes I wonder whether, in making the world so accessible, we have lost a little of the beautiful uncertainty that once came with travelling. And, by the way, there was no AI to help us. We had to run.

More information: Capri

 The wind comes freshly out of the east. 
Capri is growing into a wonderful clearness.

Angela Brazil

ISCHIA, THE BEAUTIFUL ISLAND WHERE FIRE BECAME LIFE

Musings of The Grandma...

When most people think of the Bay of Napoli, they immediately picture Mount Vesuvius, Capri or the colourful streets of Napoli itself. Yet just beyond the horizon lies an island that has quietly witnessed nearly three thousand years of Mediterranean history. Its name is Ischia.

Known as L'Isola Verde -the Green Island- Ischia is much more than a beautiful holiday destination. It is a place where volcanoes created fertile landscapes, where Greeks established one of the earliest colonies in the western Mediterranean, where medieval castles rose from volcanic rock, and where thermal waters have been attracting visitors since Roman times.

Like the nearby Phlegraean Fields, Ischia reminds us that destruction and creation often come from the same geological forces. Everything on Ischia begins with volcanoes. The island was formed through volcanic activity over hundreds of thousands of years. Although no eruption has occurred since 1302, the island is far from geologically inactive. Hot springs, fumaroles and steaming soils reveal that enormous amounts of heat still remain beneath its surface.

Unlike the dramatic cone of Vesuvius, Ischia's volcanic history has produced a softer landscape of rolling hills, lush forests and fertile valleys. At its centre rises Monte Epomeo, nearly 800 metres above sea level, offering breathtaking views over the Bay of Napoli.

Rather than dominating the island like a volcano, Monte Epomeo is the visible expression of powerful underground forces that slowly lifted parts of the island over thousands of years. The result is one of Campania's most diverse landscapes in an area of only 46 square kilometres.

Around the eighth century BC they founded Pithekoussai, considered one of the earliest Greek settlements in the western Mediterranean. Archaeological excavations have revealed a thriving commercial community connected to Greece, Etruria and the wider Mediterranean world. One of its greatest discoveries is the famous Nestor's Cup, a small ceramic drinking vessel carrying one of the oldest known inscriptions written in the Greek alphabet. This tiny object has become enormously important for historians because it demonstrates how writing, poetry and trade travelled together across the ancient Mediterranean.

Long before Italy existed as a nation, Ischia was already a crossroads of civilizations. The Romans quickly recognised another extraordinary feature of Ischia. Its thermal waters. Volcanic heat naturally warms groundwater, creating dozens of mineral-rich springs whose temperatures range from pleasantly warm to almost boiling. Roman aristocrats built baths, villas and luxurious retreats throughout the island, convinced that these waters could cure arthritis, skin diseases and countless other ailments.

Today, Ischia remains one of Europe's most famous spa destinations. Unlike many modern wellness resorts, however, these thermal waters are not artificial. They emerge naturally from the volcanic heart of the island, just as they have for thousands of years. Nature still performs the same work that fascinated Roman physicians two millennia ago.

If one image defines Ischia, it is undoubtedly the Castello Aragonese. Standing dramatically on a rocky volcanic islet connected to the mainland by a stone bridge, the castle appears to rise directly from the sea. Although the site has ancient origins, the fortress owes much of its current appearance to the Aragonese rulers during the fifteenth century. Over the centuries it became far more than a military fortress. It housed monasteries, churches, noble residences, gardens and even an entire small community protected behind its walls. Walking through its narrow streets today feels like travelling through several centuries at once. From its terraces, visitors enjoy one of the most spectacular panoramas in southern Italy, where the Tyrrhenian Sea meets the Gulf of Napoli under the shadow of Vesuvius.

Life on Ischia has never been entirely peaceful. Like the neighbouring Phlegraean Fields, the island experiences earthquakes related to its volcanic nature. One of the most destructive occurred in 1883, devastating the town of Casamicciola Terme and causing thousands of deaths. More recently, in 2017, another earthquake reminded residents that although Ischia appears tranquil, geological forces continue beneath their feet. Yet, just like the people of Napoli and Pozzuoli, the islanders have learned to live with this reality. It is remarkable how communities shaped by volcanoes often develop a profound appreciation for everyday life. Perhaps living beside nature's immense power teaches people not to postpone happiness.

The same volcanic soils that once erupted in fire now sustain extraordinary vegetation. Lemon trees, vineyards, olive groves and Mediterranean forests flourish thanks to mineral-rich ground and a mild climate. One of the island's greatest treasures is La Mortella, a magnificent botanical garden created by composer William Walton and his wife Susana. Here, exotic plants from every continent grow alongside Mediterranean species, demonstrating once again how volcanic landscapes often become surprisingly fertile. Fire eventually gives birth to life.

Like Procida and the Bay of Napoli, Ischia has inspired generations of artists. Its colourful villages, dramatic cliffs and peaceful beaches have appeared in films, novels and countless paintings. Yet what makes Ischia unforgettable is not simply its beauty. It is its atmosphere. Unlike some famous tourist destinations, the island still preserves an authentic rhythm of daily life. Fishermen continue repairing their nets. Families gather in the evening squares. Local cafés fill with conversations that last long after sunset. Visitors are not simply observing the island. For a few days, they become part of it.

Many travellers arrive in Ischia looking for beaches. They leave remembering something entirely different. They remember Roman baths fed by volcanic heat. Greek history buried beneath vineyards. A medieval castle rising from black volcanic rock. Thermal springs flowing endlessly from beneath the earth. And above all, they remember an island where geology and humanity have been writing the same story for thousands of years.

Whenever I think of Ischia, I realise that it is impossible to separate it from the rest of Campania. Procida, Baia, Pozzuoli, Napoli, Vesuvius and Ischia all belong to the same living landscape, shaped by fire, sea and history. Each island, each harbour and each volcano tells a different chapter of the same extraordinary story. Perhaps that is why Campania feels so unique. Few places on Earth allow you to walk through ancient Greek settlements in the morning, explore Roman ruins in the afternoon, sail across a volcanic gulf at sunset and end the day soaking in thermal waters warmed by the Earth's interior. 

Ischia is not simply another island in the Mediterranean. It is a reminder that some of the world's most beautiful places were born from its most powerful forces.

When The Grandma first arrived in Napoli as a student, everyone kept telling her: "Go to the port. Go to Baia. Go to Ischia." She thought they were politely telling her to go away. Only later did she realise that, when she said she was Catalan, they thought of the Crown of Aragon and wanted her to discover the Aragonese castles that still define their landscape. It was her first lesson about Napoli: people there don't just give directions -they tell stories.

More information: Castello Aragonese d'Ischia

I suppose it had never struck him that, Ischia, 
which he looked at every evening to see 
what the weather would be like the next day, 
or Vesuvius, pearly in the dawn, 
had anything to do with him at all; 
but when he ceased to have them 
before his eyes he realized, 
in some dim fashion that they were 
as much part of him as his hands and his feet.

W. Somerset Maugham

CONGRATS, MORGANS! FAIR WINDS & FOLLOWING SEAS!

 

The Grandma wants to pause her journey through Campania to talk about The Morgans, her last wonderful family, from whom she has received fantastic news today: they have secured another long-sought-after treasure they worked hard to find.

Congratulations, Morgans. May your magic map never cease to guide you to any treasure hidden beneath an X -though you should never forget that the true treasure is you. Good luck in Jamaica!

All over this world
Desolate

All over creation
Desolate

Got cause from the wicked man
Got cause from the man
Got cause from the heathen man
Got cause from the bad man, man, man

Gold and silver
Split up the gold and silver
Share up the gold and silver

More information: Saltwater Journal

 Life's pretty good, and why wouldn't it be? 
I'm a pirate, after all.

Johnny Depp

ISOLA DI PROCIDA, THE SOUL OF THE BAY OF NAPOLI

Musings of The Grandma...

Some places become famous because they are spectacular. Others become unforgettable because they are authentic. Procida belongs to the second group. The smallest island in the Bay of Napoli is often overshadowed by its glamorous neighbours, Capri and Ischia. Yet those who take the short ferry ride soon discover that Procida offers something increasingly rare in today's world: the feeling of a place that still belongs to its people.

There are no grand boulevards lined with luxury boutiques. No crowds searching for the perfect postcard. Instead, there are narrow streets where neighbours still greet each other by name, fishing boats gently rocking in colourful harbours and laundry hanging between pastel-painted houses exactly as it has for generations.

Procida is not trying to impress visitors. It simply invites them to slow down. The island has been inhabited since Greek times, but its strategic position made it an important settlement throughout the Roman period and the Middle Ages. Over the centuries, however, its inhabitants learned that life at sea brought not only prosperity but also danger.

Pirate raids were once a constant threat. To protect themselves, entire communities built their homes high above the coast in what is now Terra Murata, the oldest part of the island. Surrounded by defensive walls and crowned by the imposing Abbazia di San Michele Arcangelo, it still offers one of the finest panoramic views of the Bay of Napoli.

Walking through Terra Murata feels like travelling back in time. Stone archways, narrow alleyways and quiet courtyards preserve centuries of island history. Below the fortified hill lies perhaps the most photographed corner of Procida: Marina Corricella. Its houses seem almost unreal. Pink. Yellow. Blue. Orange. Green. The colours were not chosen for tourists or photographers.

Local tradition suggests they helped fishermen recognise their homes from the sea as they returned after long days of fishing. Whether entirely true or partly legend, the result is one of the Mediterranean's most enchanting waterfronts. Unlike many famous coastal villages, Corricella has remained remarkably peaceful. Cars are almost absent. The harbour belongs to fishing boats, cafés and conversations. It is a place where time seems to move at the rhythm of the tides.

Cinema also discovered Procida's quiet beauty. The island served as the setting for several films, including Il Postino (The Postman), whose gentle story perfectly captures the atmosphere that still defines the island today. Yet Procida's identity extends beyond beautiful scenery. For centuries, the sea shaped almost every family.

Many islanders became sailors in the Italian merchant navy, spending months -or even years- crossing the world's oceans before returning home. This maritime tradition created a community whose horizon was never limited by the coastline. Perhaps that explains the island's unique character. Small in size. Immense in spirit.
In 2022, Procida was named Italian Capital of Culture, a recognition that celebrated not monuments or museums alone, but an entire way of life. The award acknowledged something visitors had understood long before. Culture is not only found in great works of art.

Sometimes it lives in everyday gestures, in stories passed from one generation to the next, in colourful harbours where fishermen still mend their nets beneath the Mediterranean sun. That is the real treasure of Procida. It is not an island that asks to be admired. It is an island that quietly teaches us that beauty often lies in simplicity, authenticity and community.

Leaving Procida by ferry, one last glance reveals the pastel houses slowly fading into the horizon. It is then that many visitors realise something unexpected. They have not simply visited another island in the Bay of Napoli. They have discovered its soul.

More information: Mademoiselle Voyage

 Senti. Non mi va di vedere Procida 
mentre s'allontana, e si confonde, 
diventa come una cosa grigia... 
Preferisco fingere che non sia esistita.
Listen. I don't feel like watching Procida 
as it moves away, and blurs, 
becoming like something gray... 
I prefer to pretend it never existed.

Elsa Morante