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Paestum

Paestum is an old Greek colony south of the Amalfi Coast. It holds the largest and best preserved Greek ruins and temples outside of the Acropolis. It also has a pleasant, unpopulated beach.

We arrived after dark, in a train depot with one attendant, no phones or cabs and no town in sight. After several attempts to communicate with the depot attendant, we gathered that some hotels could be found a few kilometers down the road running past the depot.

Trudging off into the darkness with our backpacks and a single penlight torch, we bravely followed the directions (as best as we could determine them) that we received from the attendant.

Just when we were ready to recheck our dictionary for "left", "right" and "straight ahead", the road opened up and exposed a wondrous site... before us rose several magnificant Greek temples, lit with variously colored spotlights. The imagery was spectacular.

We found a small hotel on the corner of the road; the patron was just wrapping up the kitchen, but assured us that there was an available room and that was still time for dinner.

Dinner was simple, but splendid. After our pasta, our host served us fresh tomatoes from his garden, with slices of local buffalo cheese, basil and olive oil. To this day, I remember the intense and satisfying flavors of that dish.

A German couple was also staying at the inn. The patron spoke to them in what apeared to me to be fluent German; we spoke in broken Italian. The German gentleman borrowed a guitar from the patron's son and began doing some decent rendetions of 50's American rock and jazz classics.

The following day, we wondered through the huge, largely unrecovered Greek and Roman ruins.