Day tours from Naples to Pompeii, Mt Vesuvius, Herculaneum

I just found this offering guided tour to Pompeii and Mt. Vesuvius with possible lunch.
https://www.viator.com/tours/Naples/Naples-Pompeii-and-Vesuvius-full-day-tour-from-Naples/d508-2958P51

This one is for just Herculaneum
https://www.viator.com/tours/Naples/Herculaneum-Group-Tour-from-Naples/d508-18971P29

Pompeii is very easy to get to from Naples -- easy train ride. There are private guides at the entrance to Pompeii. Our's was excellent and will tailor the tour to your time and interests. There is really not a lot to see at Vesuvius. It is a long, somewhat steep climb to the rim and you look down into a slightly smoky caldera. Not sure what I expected but it was disappointing. I would not make the effort to go it again. Haven't make it to Herculaneum yet. Understand it is mostly underground.

I understand your desire to have a guide for an enhanced experience. However, I don’t think a guide is as critical for Herculaneum. It’s easy enough to get to. The site is kind of small (relative to Pompeii.) Most importantly though, I thought the audio guide was excellent, one of the best. I thought it gave very good context to everything, and did not find it dry or dull.

Buongiorno! We used City Wonders for a guided tour of Pompeii, wine tasting and lunch at the base of Mt. V, then a steep hike up to the mouth of the volcano. It was a small group tour (maybe 6-8) with a convenient central pick up/drop off.

Herculaneum is mostly below grade, in the architectural sense. But it is entirely open to the fresh air, and you will get wet if it's raining, except for a small number of interiors (which were closed the day we were there ...).

Although we don't care for guided tours much, I agree that satisfactory guides will be waiting at the entrances to both of these major attractions. Herculaneum is less busy than Pompeii, but it's still very busy. Note that, unlike Pompeii, it is a 15-minute walk from the Circumvesuviana station, and steeply downhill.

Have you asked your hotel to recommend tours? We also used our hotel to recommend car services for other visits. (You don't need a car service for Pompeii and Herculaneum, unless you have a disability. And both sites have difficult walking conditions underfoot, because of Roman stone roads.

Edit: Herculaneum-the-ancient-site itself is very flat. It has a modern ADA-sloped wheelchair ramp entry, although that doesn't help with the Roman stone road paving when you get to the bottom! By "downhill", I mean the modern sidewalks in the modern city of Herculaneum (Ercolano). Another difference is that Pompeii has plenty of hot food for sale inside. Herculaneum has, at best, a vending machine or two. And neither side allows same-day re-entry on your official ticket. You have to plan for lunch outside carefully, especially because of fresh-slow-food policies in Italy in general.

Surprisingly, there are limited number of food options within quick walking of both sites. And the sit-down restaurants typically serve only conventional lunch hours, like 11:45-2:00 (sample, made-up hours ... )

Cyndie, I see from another of your posts that you and your friend are "elderly ladies" and had some concerns about walking some distance whilst pulling your suitcases? What Frank said about the climb to the viewing summit of Vesuvius should be carefully considered: the uphill path is rough and the surface is loose so if you're not much of a hiker or are unsteady on surface materials than can slide (returning DOWNHILL is reported to be trickier than going up) you should reconsider. Also, the parking lot where cars must stop is at a lower point than where tour buses drop passengers so makes for a longer hike.

Should you skip this, never fear; you can see the volcano rising ominously (the thing is still active, BTW) over the excavations of the cities it once destroyed.

My husband and I climbed Mt Vesuvius and enjoyed it very much. We both thought the volcano was interesting and the views were wonderful. However, it is a loose dirt path and quite steep so unless you are into hiking, you might not enjoy it as much as we did. You can only go so far up with a guided tour (we took one that we purchased in Sorrento, although Naples is actually closer) and you have to hike the rest of the way. Now the guided part was that they drove us to the parking lot and we hiked up on our own.

We did Mt. Vesuvius a different day than Pompeii and would never have wanted to do them the same day. We went to Pompeii again from Sorrento and after buying tickets for entry, we bought tickets to join a guided tour. It was a group tour and quite good. We had lunch on site after the tour ended and then wandered around for a couple hours on our own.