So I started my 2 week Italian adventure in Naples. People say Naples is unsafe but I never felt unsafe even walking around at 3am (though I wouldn’t recommend that). I stayed at the hostel called Hostel of the Sun. I loved it! theres was a pasta dinner, a bar in the hostel, social events, and air conditioning. Right as I was checking in I a met another traveller and we decided to get some pizza! The pizza is definitely different but all the ingredients are very simple and fresh which I enjoyed. I had missed the free walking tour but another tourist had gone on the tour the day before and offered to take a group of us out and show us the city. I really like Naples, the churches, the fresh gelato, and the bellinis!
First pizza I had in Naples
I did a day trip to Pompei from Naples, it was interesting and I recommend it. My only issue that day was it was 40 celsius. There was a train I took that went directly to Pompei, then I hired a tour guide, I believe it was about 15 euro, you can do it by yourself but the guides do have really great information.
I actually had a killer ear infection and cold while in Rome, unfortunately I had booked my train onwards in advance so I really didn’t see much of Rome other than the doctors office, and my hostel bed (I stayed at The Yellow, its walking distance from the train and is a very popular hostel, they have a nice restaurant and bar, they also helped me a bunch with arranging seeing a doctor).
My favourite city in Italy and one of my favourites in all Europe! First off my hostel was amazing, I stayed at Plus Florence. They had a pool with a waterfall which was amazing because temperatures were close to 40 celsius. But the hostel was central so I walked all over the city instead of using transit. I met a group of girls staying in my dorm and spent a couple days with them. We went to the Boboli gardens, watched the sunset at Piazzale Michelangelo, and had a delicious dinner. I also wandered solo and went to several art galleries, saw a Salvador Dali exhibit that I really enjoyed. The buildings in Florence are so beautiful you can just wander through the streets all day exploring.
So my time in Venice was a little bit tainted by my hostel, it was very poorly run and the owner didn’t put any love into the place. The bathrooms were unclean, the bunkbeds were super poor quality, most of the rooms had bedbugs. But this is not normal of most hostels! If you are worried about staying at hostels they are usually amazing, and a much better way to meet other travellers than hotels or Airbnb. I always look at Hostelworld or google the hostel name to check the reviews. Anyways my second day in Venice a Mariachi band and dancers from Colorado checked into my hostel. They were so great! It was a group of about 10 of them who were touring around Italy and performing. I made friends with them and I got to watch them practice and we wandered the streets of Venice and bought some delicious fruits. That night their dorm room woke up at 2am by being bit by bedbugs so they had a big disagreement with the hostel owner and moved on to a different hostel the next day.
In conclusion I can’t wait to get back to Italy, I would definitely like to go back to Rome to actually see it and back to Florence but there’s so many other cities I’d like to see as well. The Cinque Terre is supposed to be amazing.
