Adjusting to life in Campania - written by Anne

I’ve found a new homeland; Sorrento & the Amalfi Coast are just breath-taking.  The scent of lemons & oranges is everywhere.  The views are either shady, leafy orchards with HUGE lemons, orange, cherry & olive trees OR the breath-taking beautiful coastal views overlooking Mt Vesuvius, along the Sorrento Peninsula & out to Capri Island.  Nothing beats sitting back with a cool lemoncillo topped with sparkling wine and just taking it all in!

 

The Campania driving is a new thing all together (Marvin will blog about his take on driving the Amalfi Coast), but to me the driving illustrates the people – chaotic, risk taking with a touch of aloofness/arrogance, but all done in a friendly way.  All the cars are tiny (think Fiat Bambina, Fiat Punto), and the vast majority are full of dents and scraps especially on their fenders.  Take a typical NZ street & turn it into a 4 lane highway, put in bumper to bumper cars driving along, add in the cars parked on the side of the road (despite the NO PARKING signs) and then put in the pedestrians as there are no footpaths outside the one main street.  Then narrow the width of the road to half & turn it into cobblestones with a few potholes – now that is driving along the Amalfi/Campania coast!  The people think it’s normal to overtake on blind corners, vespas permanently sit on the centre line & just serve in and out to overtake & avoid the oncoming vespas.  Take the speed limit and add 30 – 50km and that is the speed they travel!  Needless to say, it is so exciting and terrifying at the same time  – who needs a bungy jump over here, just get behind the steering wheel!

 

 

It’s a great novelty to have a kitchen & cooking facilities again after 3 weeks in Asia of street food.  The kids take responsibility for planning each evening meal, then going to the market to select & purchase the food & drinks.  Marvin & I are the washer uppers!  Every day finds a new type of bread, cheese, cold meat, pasta that the kids insist we try. Homemade Caprese salad, homemade pasta sauces, lemoncillo and a different chianti every night for the grown up’s!

The campground is perfect & the kids, with football and swimming being the main interactive activities to meet others.  Already they have meet English, Koreans, amazing Italian soccer buffs.

What a life we are having!