Naples
Naples was just as chaotic and crazy as I had heard, especially in the historic center and the Quartieri Spagnoli (Spanish Quarter), with motorcycles zipping down narrow cobblestone alleyways and around corners, but it offered a few surprises, too.
As a pedestrian, I sometimes felt that walking around town to a museum or to find dinner was like being in a video game, with an obstacle around every corner ready to take you out.
Naples is a city of hills and steps so I found walking to be a challenge at times in other ways, especially since I had come down with a respiratory bug. Here's the link to a video we shot on our last morning, climbing the steps outside our apartment complex.
Most people in the center of town live in mid rise apartment buildings, with a small balcony being their only outdoor space. As we walked by or rode by on the tour bus, it was common to see people standing out on their balconies smoking cigarettes or talking on the phone.
Sophia Loren is a bit of an icon here, partially thanks to the 1960 Vittorio de Sica film, "It Started in Naples," where she starred alongside Clark Gable.
Our apartment was about 300 meters from the Metro and one stop from the National Archeological Museum of Naples, so we visited on our first day.
they also have an extensive Egyptian collection, with some mummified remains, including one of a mummified crocodile believed to have been the reincarnation of one of their gods.
A Napoli city tour gave us a broader view of the city outside the historic center. It showed us that Naples has a classically elegant side, away from the chaos of the center.
We saw many beautiful apartment buildings. Zoom in on the detail around the windows of this one.
This is actually the coffee shop we stopped in after the tour but it was so elegant, it's worth mentioning here.
It also has a thriving port for cruise ships, commercial vessels, and leisure craft.
We only had three days in Naples but we had some memorable bites and sips:
A beautifully presented Caprese salad on a bed of mixed greens.
A visit to Pescheria Azzurra fish market and restaurant, recommended by a friend and also our bnb host, also provided some best bites.
The freshly fried seafood was a generous mix of calamari, salmon, anchovies, swordfish, cod, shrimp, and tuna, all served with a wedge of fresh lemon to squeeze over it and a few zeppole (fried dough balls) tossed in for good measure.
We had pizza when we first arrived in Naples back in April but since pizza was invented there, we felt like we couldn't leave without eating just one more. We went to Pizzeria Starita which was highly recommended by our bnb host.
Unfortunately, we found the pizza soggy and the antipasto salad had too many overly salted "bastons" of fried pizza dough and not enough salad greens. It looked pretty though.
The best bite here was the ricotta-stuffed deep-fried zucchini blossom.
There were many great bites of dolces. On the not too sweet side were the crunchy Napolitano specialty, taralli, studded with almonds and flavored with black pepper.
But my favorites were the ricotta-based pastries: Sfogliatella with shatteringly crisp layers of pastry and sweet ricotta filling flavored with orange (bottom right in the photo above). And cannoli where the shells were first lined with a thin layer of chocolate before filling with the ricotta cream to keep everything nice and crispy and extra flavorful (top right).
The Matarazzos we met in Sperlinga told us that the name Matarazzo originated in Naples. I couldn't help but wonder how many Matarazzos still live there. I miss the days of printed white pages phone books where one could easily look up that information.
I wonder if my ancestors lived in those small apartments with just a balcony for outdoor space. I know my own father would have felt claustrophobic. I know I would have too.
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