Today we are talking about a beautiful experience we have lived in the last ten days and which involved a group of friends in wheelchairs and their carers, coming from different parts of Italy. We are talking about the ConosciAmo Napoli tour, organized by the Neapolitan tour operator Cosy for You (https://cosyfair.com/), specialized in accessible tourism. The trip took place between 19 and 26 September 2018 in Naples city, with two days dedicated respectively to Sorrento and Pompeii. The seated warriors and their companions are Vinicio and Vittoria, Orietta and Fiorenzo, Maria Piera and Gerardo, Rita and Maria Grazia, Germano and Ornella, as well as the two of us, Adele and Angelo. We especially thank Fiorenzo and Germano for their contribution to the photographs illustrating this post. The experience was certainly positive for the quality of the organization and for the variety of sites and places visited; the movements took place with an agile equipped minibus, excellent for getting around Naples, and with wide walks in the various locations. In this regard it is right to mention our guides Miriam and Maddy, the drivers Vito and Maurizio, who made the tour physically possible, together with the organization curated by Ileana, Paola and Marisa. As for Naples city, the characteristic already underlined last year by a visitor to our blog, Rita da Modena, who had described her difficulties in getting around the city with a wheelchair, was confirmed. In fact, in many streets there are no ramps to get on and off the sidewalks, which creates problems especially for chairs with electric traction, heavier than manual ones; consequently in some cases we have been forced to make them walk in the street. To this type of difficulty is added, in some cases, the lack of civic sense of those who park cars in such a way as to hinder the passage on the sidewalks and of those who in broad daylight always deposit industrial quantities of cartons on the sidewalks, also an obstacle to who moves in a wheelchair. This situation was promptly denounced by Ileana on the Cosy for You Facebook page, but we do not deceive ourselves, the road to reach a European-type standard of behavior is still long and tiring. But let's say no to melancholy and let's take a look at the many beautiful things we have been able to see and the tours we have been able to do: Seafront:
Virgilian Park :
the church, the majolica cloister and the Roman baths of Santa Chiara (here, as in other cases, we entered thanks to the portable ramps made available by the organization):
After the exciting visit to that marvel that is the Sansevero Chapel with the Veiled Christ of Sammartino, where you cannot take photos, there was a visit to the Cathedral, which took place the day after the feast of San Gennaro, with the celebrations still in progress:
Let's now pass to the Capodimonte Astronomical Observatory (to which we have already dedicated a separate post):
We then reached and visited the Museum and the Royal Palace of Capodimonte:
Another day was dedicated to Vomero with a visit to the Certosa di San Martino and Castel Sant'Elmo:
and last but not least the "Duca di Martina" Ceramics Museum and the Villa Floridiana:
The day ended with a nice walk "inside" the sea on the North Pier of the former Italsider:
Another highlight was the discovery of the Catacombs of San Gennaro, with the guided tour organized by the La Paranza Cooperative which has been working for years for the cultural and human development of the Rione Sanità:
We then reached the Royal Palace:
And now let's move on to Sorrento, where things have been easier than in Naples, with a nice Corso Italia where the sidewalks have been leveled with the pedestrianized road. Here is the Cathedral:
this is the source that saw the baptism of Torquato Tasso, the most famous Sorrentino:
Here are some of the beautiful pieces exhibited at the Museum of the Wooden Inlay (http://www.museomuta.it/) a meritorious private institution founded and directed by the architect Alessandro Fiorentino with the aim of preserving and making known the masterpieces of Sorrento inlay:
and here is a beautiful view of the Sorrento coast:
The Sorrento day ended in the Annunziata hamlet of Massa Lubrense, with a spectacular view of Capri and the image of the historic Villa Murat:
The tour continued the next day with a visit to the Pompeii excavations; the validity of the Pompeii per tutti path has been confirmed, which allows you to walk the entire Via dell'Abbondanza up to the Forum, albeit with some more difficult passage for larger wheelchairs (everything can be improved, of course):
We closed the archaeological day with a touch of technological modernity: we are talking about the Virtual Archaeological Museum (MAV) of Herculaneum, a structure where you can see digital images that virtually reconstruct the physiognomy of Pompeii and Herculaneum as they must have been before the eruption. of 79 AD:
From the M.A.V. in a hundred meters we reached the historic entrance of the Herculaneum excavations that can be admired from above before the official entrance with the ticket office:
The tour ended the next day with a quick visit to the National Archaeological Museum of Naples (MANN); particular attention was given to the mosaics section and to the statues found in the Villa dei Papiri in Herculaneum:
Of course this we have provided is only an illustration of part of the things we have seen: we hope it will be enough to entice other seated warriors to come and visit our city and its magnificent surroundings!