January 1st to January 21st


We had a wonderful white Christmas in New York with my mother and father,
Stacy and Rob and Jaclyn and Jason.  We were able to see most of our friends
at Jackie and Jason's surprise party; they were both VERY surprised.
However, our stay of less than a month was much too short and hectic.

We rented a car and drove from the Rome airport to Gaeta, which took about
an hour and a half. The minimum duration for renting the car was three days
so we put off getting settled in and immediately did some sight seeing. We
drove up a winding road to a nearby hill, 4500 ft., to experience the
beautiful view and our surroundings.  We also drove along the Amafia Coast,
which was breaktaking. We watched the setting sun slowly sink behind Capri
as we drove back toward Gaeta.  It took us much longer to complete our
driving adventure along the coast than we expected because we didn't realize
how many inlets and bays we had to negotiate.  With Rudy's expert driving we
had no trouble, but it was after dark when we arrived at our boat. After we
returned the car to Rome we finally got down to getting settled and ready
for the rest of the winter.

We had a New Years' party with the rest of the cruisers at the marina. The
food was great and we all enjoyed our entrance into the New Year. The
weather during early January was horrible! We had relentless rain and wind
for almost two weeks straight. We spent a lot of time on board to be sure
Boundless was safe and secure in the wind and it was too wet to do much of
anything else. When the weather abated a bit we couldn't wait to get off of
the boat. We ate out a lot at local restaurants and on other cruisers'
boats.  We made some trips to local towns and supermarkets, (a unique love
of all cruisers), with Joan and John on Seascape (they have a Van) and Ross
and Wei on Gemini. Needless to say we also had several dominoes matches.
(Faith was generally the big winner!)

On January 17th, we drove to Pompeii with Joan and John from Seascape and
spent five hours walking through the ruins. Although Mt. Vesuvius erupted in
69A.D., Pompeii was not discovered until the mid-1700s. Archaeological digs
continue today. It was a fantastic find because not only were the streets,
walls, and frescos in the houses and temples still intact, but
archaeologists also found everyday objects (furnishings, jewellery, tools,
food, drink) and even the bodies of people.  I have read about this place
for a long time, but until I walked into this historical and archaeological
ruin, I didn't realize the immense area of the city and the wealth that it
must have contained.  We entered many of the houses including the "official"
brothel called the Luanare (lupa means prostitute in Latin) with frescoes of
various positions on the walls and temples to Jupiter, Vepasian, Venus and
Apollo.  Inside the Villa of Mysteries, was a cycle of frescos consisting of
29 beautiful life-size figures against a Pompeian red background that
occupied all the walls in the dining hall.  Scholars feel it is the
initiation of a young woman, perhaps a bride, to the Dionysian cult.  We
also sat in the small and large Amphitheatres. And the baths..they were
everywhere.  Many of the larger houses had there own baths, but there was
also a huge bath house in the center of the city that had hot baths, cold
baths, dressings rooms, (men and women had separate sections) gymnasium and
gardens where you could relax and talk to your friends.  Like all of today's
cities they also had bakeries, bars, laundries, workshops, merchant store
fronts, wool and wine making buildings, administration buildings and much
more. It really was a great city!

 No matter where we walked, we could see Mt. Vesuvius looming in the
background as though it wanted to tell its side to the story!!! But for our
day, Mt. Vesuvius kept quiet.thank goodness!!!

Tomorrow we are taking a plane to London again (only $20 plus tax each) to
try to buy a car.  It seems none of the other countries in Europe will let
tourists easily purchase a vehicle for local use. If we are successful, we
will drive back to Gaeta stopping along the way at many yet unplanned sites.