A long, sloping walk initially takes you along one side of Herculaneum, affording views down to the uncovered parts of the town as well as further up to the modern buildings. This gives you a good feel for just how much ash was dumped during the volcano’s eruption, although you get a better understanding when you get into the streets of the town itself, obviously. A bridge over a moat-like structure then takes you into Herculaneum.

During the eruption of Vesuvius Pompeii had been in downwind so most of the initial debris falling from the sky destroyed the town. Herculaneum lay to the west of the volcano so was only initially coated with a little ash and the place was mostly evacuated. Overnight, however, the pyroclastic surges hit the town which had been on the shore; waves of heat killed people who were left instantly while leaving much of the material such as wood, roofs, bedding, etc. intact, albeit buried. So much ash fell on the town (twenty metres as opposed to Pompeii’s four) that the shoreline advanced considerably and the place was all but forgotten to history until the digging of a well in the 18th century led to the beginning of extensive archaeology. Only a fraction of Herculaneum has been uncovered due to the nearby city buildings and the need to preserve what is there.

There were lots of preserved details of tiles, mosaics, wall decorations, etc. Herculaneum was a truly fantastic place with some truly jaw dropping moments as you stood in the streets looking up to where the ash had settled or looking out to where the sea used to be. It’s one of those places where you frequently find yourself realising just how scarily powerful nature can be. You also get a great feel for just how impressive the town would have been to live in.

Although it looks overcast from the photos of Herculaneum it never rained while we visited. The excavation, being within a recess in the ground, acted as a heat trap, though, so the combination of heat and humidity made the visit a little tiring but definitely worth it. Walking around was never a problem, the size of the site was just about right for the time we had there, and it wasn’t packed; we heard a few stories back on the Royal Princess about the excursions to visit Pompeii being more hectic, crowded, and fleeting so if you’re only in the city of Naples for a day and looking to see a site covered by volcanic ash almost two thousand years ago then I’d recommend Herculaneum as probably the better option.

The brutalist design present in the impressive but abandoned Casa Del Portuale building (architect: Aldo Loris Rossi) was the stand out piece on view…

…unless you count Mount Vesuvius which could be seen from up on deck, of course.

We’d booked an excursion with Princess Cruises for our day in Naples as we like to make sure we’re taken care of and in safe hands for our first time in any new port (we talked to some people at dinner that evening who had headed to Capri on their own but had run into traffic problems on the way back, had to ring the ship to let them know they might be late (but nobody answered the emergency number!), and had their taxi driver weaving in and out of vehicles at over 100 kph to get them back on time).

The main point of our excursion was to visit the nearby excavation of the buried town of Herculaneum (photos and review in the next portfolio post) but as is the way with many cruise ship trips there was an initial stop to allow people to be persuaded to part with more money for things they never thought they wanted. In this case it was a cameo-making workshop which couldn’t have interested us less on paper but was actually quite fascinating to take a look at up close. We got to hear a little bit of history about making cameos and there was no denying the skill involved but the pieces just weren’t to our tastes.