Rome/Naples/Pompeii

hit rome first...i believe arriving and leaving from the same place is cheaper..but if you have $$ to not care..do plan A. the train to naples from rome is delightful..check out the very cool graffiti..hate to say this...but some of that stuff on the walls was as good as then any art i saw in a museum...only two days is tough..u need to combine both getting there and seeing it ALL, and relaxing and seeing what u can slowly.
good luck on that.
j

Rick covers this in his Rome book, also the Italy book. He suggests using Sorrento as a base instead of Naples. I did that, loved Sorrento. Pompeii is an easy and cheap train ride from Sorrento (or from Naples).

If you haven't done Sorrento, I would recommend staying there. We were coming from northern Italy. Our train passed through Rome and on to Naples. In Naples we got on the local train (yes, my husband was pick-pocketed as Rick describes--a local watched it happened, stopped the train and tossed them off)and went to Sorrento. We took the train up to Pompeii for the day. We ended up extending our stay in Sorrento before heading to Rome (where we flew out of).

Jim -- that is not absolutely true. Sometimes open jaw tickets can actually be cheaper. We save two hundred per person flying to Rome and home from Zurich. A couple years ago it was cheaper to fly into Paris and home from London. So you should at least check the possibility of an open jaw ticket.

Our family of four went to Rome for six days in March 2006. We stayed in Rome and took a day trip to Naples and Pompeii. We took a Carrani (sp?) tour. We stopped for lunch, and the lunch was pretty bad. Our guide at Pompeii was outstanding. However, you don't really need a guide at Pompeii. The handsets seemed excellent, and you can go at your own pace. We had a long day, but it was worth it.

Jim, We flew into Naples and out of Rome. Our tickets were $100 each more than if we'd flown into and out of Rome. You can not fly from the US into Naples. We did Denver/Munich/Naples Rome/Munich/Denver.

As other posters have said - don't stay in Naples. Go to Sorrento or that area. And stay three nights so you have two full days. I'd stay longer - but I love The Sorrentine Penninsula and could live there.

We, too, extended our stay in Sorrento. It's a captivating area!

i HAVE to respond to Sally's post: i too was told to stay out of naples: it is polluted, dirty, CRAZY traffic.
i was going to stay one day: it was dirty, polluted, traffic was CRAZY.
i stayed 5 days..it was WONDERFUL! great food, really nice ppl, free. was in rome, florence[pompeii], nettuno. naples was the MOST italian.if i ever get a chance to do it again, naples is on the front of the list..fewer tourists, truly happy cool folks there.
oh..yeah ...did i mention the food?

I would agree with Jim, Naples gets a bad rap. Sorrento is very nice, heck with all the Brits, more English is spoken there than most US cities. It is just a nice safe tourist town, not nearly as pretentious as Positano, and to be honest, I'll probably stay there my next trip. But Naples has a little edge, not nearly as notorious (OK, the recent garbage issue was a problem) or unsafe as rumored, and probably alot more authentic than most cities. And yes, the food!

I have to agree with Jim and Paul, the food in Naples is fantastic, and you get to see a REAL Italian town. But we loved our stay in Sorrento. Ya, it was full of "Brits", but it was so central to the Almalfi area, and the food is not bad there.

We have flown in and out of the Naples airport, after a transfer. We took the bus to Sorrento, and we have taken the bus to the train station/downtown for other transfers. Easy and convenient.

For my money, the farther south you go in Italy/Sicily, the better. It is great when you get out of the towns that are full of tourists.....like us.

We just got back from a week in Puglia, and if you think that the food and people are great in Naples, you should venture further south.......it just keeps getting better!

Jim, we really enjoyed the museum in Naples. Everything that was anything was plucked from the barren town of Pompeii, and taken away. we also enjoyed Herculanem more than Pompeii......the wood and paintings survived there.

yeah steve: just wish i had the audio phone at the museum..sucked looking at all the artifacts with out one, ..[BTW::: audiophones are NOT avail after 4pm, don;'t ask me why.it just is fact..i got there 4:30]

now as far as the orig.POST: keep it simple..get to, and leave from rome...getting to naples via train is pretty easy via train..plus[and i didnt realise this until months after getting back home]..u get to see the ppl, the graffiti[TRULY some of the BEST art i saw, on the walls]. the "feel".
ENJOY the train to naples from rome..i did. it was part of the trip.

We started from Rome, took a train down to Naples/Pompeii, then the train back to Rome.
The trains are comfy and the trip is beautiful!
The train station at Naples is filthy and there are announcements about every 5 min. (in several languages) about being careful and watching for pickpockets. Unfortunately, our time schedule did not allow us to actually see the city. If yours does, be sure to go to the Museum, because that's where most of the artifacts from Pompeii are.
Pompeii can be done w/o a tour guide, on your own time. LOTS of walking, very uneven terrain, very few places to sit and catch your breath. We were there in early April and the weather was lovely--blue skies, fluffy white clouds, a slight breeze.
Seeing Pompeii is mind-boggling. I'd like to go back someday.