A 75 minute delay on the flight departure, but the actual journey went smoothly. I caught the airport bus to Piazza Garibaldi, and then the Metro to Museo station. It was a 10-minute walk to the apartment from there. Gigi met me at the courtyard gate and gave me a quick tour of the apartment and its facilities. Very satisfactory.

By that time it was around ten, and I went out to catch dinner. Everywhere was busy, but by chance I arrived on cue to get a single seat in 'Antica Pizzeria dell'Angelo'. Well, it had to be a pizza on my first night and I liked it.

I explored without really knowing or caring where I was, but I found Piazza Bellini, where the cool kids hang out. I had a beer and walked the short distance home.

Sunday

It was quiet in the apartment after 3, when there had been, inexplicably, a massive crash of glass being collected for recycling; although there was a very noisy jet overhead at 0630.

Around eleven, I walked the short distance to the museum and spent nearly four hours walking my feet off. Part of the Egyptian collection was closed, and I very nearly left without checking the other end. Most was open.

I came home, shopped for wine (3 for €10) and breakfast croissants.

There were two small restaurants on my street, only 50 metres from my door, and I picked the first, Osteria Atri. Pasta, not pizza this time, and I was happy enough. I went back to Piazza Bellini (where the cool kids hang out) to people-watch (and have a beer). There's an African bar off Piazza Bellini, Teranga. I had a look in, but it was empty: obviously much too early in the evening for partying. I never did get round to returning at a more appropriate hour.

Monday

Rain! The forecast said it would be short-lived, and it was. I set off as the sky turned blue, at about eleven o'clock. I walked to Museo metro, but found that all their ticket machines were non-functional. I was about to go back to the street, where you can buy Metro tickets at certain shops and stalls, but I saw an employee, who sold me one.

The Metro station nearest my destination is Municipio, leaving a good long walk, probably a kilometre. I was heading for Castel dell'Ovo, the castle of the egg, which sits on an islet out in the sea. (The English-language text on the information panels calls it a "holm", which is perfectly correct, but someone should tell them that it's a word hardly ever used in modern English.) It's free entry. There isn't really much to see, but there are great views from its highest points.

The week before I left for Naples, I'd happened to see an Italian rom-com, "Ma Che Bella Sorpresa" (But What A Nice Surprise). It's not the sort of thing I would watch usually, but it opened with the lead actor cycling down very narrow ancient streets, and I kept it on to verify that it was really set in Naples. Which it was. A later scene was on the seafront, which looked beautiful, leading me to use Google Street View to find the location. (I'm pretty good at it. Maybe the CIA would like to hire me as an analyst?)

Further along the coast is the quite genteel Chiaia district, which has a large, shady park along the seafront (although there is a big, ugly road in the way). There are lots of restaurants, and I picked one at random and had lunch looking out to the blue sea.

When I looked at my map, I could see that Amedeo Metro station was a short distance away, but when I looked at real life, I could see that it was high above, reached by a long set of stairs. But I made it. It's on Line 2, and took me quickly to Cavour station, which is conjoined with Museo, where I'd departed that morning.

In the evening, it was time to try the other very local eatery, Trattoria Napoli Notte. That was very good, but I heard a Northern Irish voice behind me, and when I turned around to speak to its owner (Claire, from the Cavehill Road) I jogged the table (it was flimsy anyway) and knocked over my carafe of red wine. Red flowed down the little piazza. "Blood on the streets" said a woman at the next table, in English (she was Italian). A slightly embarrassing incident. I'll leave it a few weeks before going back there.

Tuesday

I caught the Right Train on the Circumvesuviana line towards Sorrento, but got off at Ercolano Scavi, which means "Herculaneum Excavations". Though I wasn't going to Herculaneum right away. A company called Vesuvio Express operates a fleet of taxi-buses to the volcano. These small vehicles are ideal for the trip, with its steep winding road, but some tour companies run full-sized coaches. We were held up for ten minutes while two such monsters tried to get past each other.

I wouldn't recommend visiting Vesuvius with your own car, because you have to park a long way down the hill, and then hike up, even to the park entrance. I've just checked on Google Maps, and it's about 2km with a climb of 200m. Operators such as Vesuvio Express can take you to the higher level.

From there, it took me about two hours to get to the highest accessible point and back, following the rim of the crater for the last part. At the highest point, there's a shack called La Capannuccia, where you can buy snacks, wine and souvenirs, but its best aspect is the viewpoint, Sorrento in one direction and Naples in the other.

When I was delivered back to Ercolano by the shuttle, I walked the short distance down hill to the Herculaneum site. I won't go into details that you can find in any guide book, but it's definitely worth the trip. More than at Pompeii, I was struck by how alien the culture seemed, while still being familiar.

One thing that is a lot like modern Naples is that there is a takeaway food outlet on every corner.

I caught the train back to Naples, and it was evening by the time I arrived. On my walk back home, I bought two local wines and three arancini. In the apartment, I ate two and drank one and went to bed.

Wednesday

It was supposed to have been a rest day after Tuesday's exertions, but I found myself doing a lot of walking. I wandered at random, and realizing that I was quite close to the port, I decided to turn it into a reconnaissance for boats to the islands Useful, because it's not obvious until you get there. When I did, there was a huge queue of people with suitcases at the ticket desk, presumably heading off to vacation on an island.

Then I navigated back, remembering the route for next time. When I got back to the Centro Storico, I began randoming again, via two tall, pointy things, one with S. Domenico on top and one with Maria. Then down Via Toledo, a major shopping street, pedestrianised in part (mostly -- this is Naples).

I got as far as the sea views off the end of Piazza Plebicito, and turned back, this time through the grid of tiny streets in the Spanish Quarter, where I had lunch in a tatty trattoria.

back home for a break, but I decided it was high time for another Naples pizza, and easily got a tale nearby at Attanasio. Maybe it was quiet that night because there was a Nap soccer match on television.

Thursday

Up early (0830) to get the boat. careful of the huge queue yesterday, I arrived an hour early, and of course, there was no queue at all, and I was an hour early.

Procida is more touristy than the guidebooks say, but still beautiful. I particularly wanted to see the pastel-coloured Marina della Corricella, which is just the other side of the old, historic town from the ferry port. Then I decided to complete the set by visiting Marina Chiaiolella, right at the other end of the island. About 3km each way, and not really much to see when I got there apart from luxury gin palaces.

When I got back to Marina Grande, it was past the ferry's departure time, but anyway, I thought I'd take the hydrofoil, which was scheduled next. It is faster, but I really only wanted to experience a different form of transport. And it was only two euros more.

Then the ferry arrived, and I realized that it was running so late I could have caught it, rather than wait another 40 minutes for the hydrofoil. But I decided to wait.

However, there was no information that the hydrofoil departed from a different quay, so I sat in the wrong place and missed it. In fact, I looked across the bay and thought "Oh look, there's a hydrofoil. But no-one's getting on it." It then departed, dead on time. I had to wait another hour for the next ferry. It wasn't really a hardship, although it was dark by the time we docked in Naples.

I happened to see, on Facebook, a post from VisitNaples.eu, extolling a local dish, Parmigiano Melanzane (basically aubergines, tomatoes and cheese) and when I went out to get dinner, I saw a place on Piazza Bellini (where the cool kids hang out) offering it as their speciality. How could I resist? Though when I got the menu, I saw that the establishment was more of a wine bar and didn't offer full meals. Still, I had their delicious Parmigiano Melanzane and a glass of wine. On the way home, I bought a fried pizza (pizza fritta) from a street outlet, so that night I sampled two different famous Naples dishes.

Friday

I set out in the morning and found myself on Via San Gregorio Armeno, which is actually in all the guidebooks, and I should have known to check it out. It's a street full of craft shops, and their speciality is presepi, Nativity scenes. Or, at least, that's how it started, centuries ago, but the art evolved into generic model scenes of everyday life, and hardly any have anything to do with the Nativity.

After that, I found myself back at Piazza Plebicito. It must have a gravitational attraction or something. This time I went into the arched vaults and courtyards of the Palazzo Reale, where it was pleasantly cool. Back in the piazza, I spotted two bars, obviously in some ancient dispute. One claimed to be "The Professor's Cafe" and the other "The real bar of the Professor".

I walked on, down Via Chiaia, a shopping street as far as Piazza dei Martiri. There's a live webcam watching the square, and I spent several minutes trying to spot it, but failed. Nevertheless, I waved vigorously in the general direction. There are always about 20 people on line watching it.

Heading homeward, I came across the "European Beer Market" stalls in Piazza Dante. I was tempted to have a beer and burger for lunch, but there was no shade and it was hot. I went to one of the usual places in Piazza Bellini (where the cool kids hang out).

Back to the apartment for a rest and a change of shoes (my feet hurt) and I checked the times for Napoli Sotterranea, just a few hundred metres away. The schedule was good: I had time to get money and join the queue. I really enjoyed the tour, which comes in two parts, first through the Greek quarries, which became Roman cisterns, which became abandoned after two thousand years in service, because of a cholera outbreak. Then they became rubbish dumps, before being cleaned out to act as air raid shelters in the Second World War.

The young guide was very entertaining, and she kept everyone laughing. For the second part of the tour, she led us through the streets to what had once been a private house. A "secret" trapdoor under the bed led to the underground remains of a Roman theatre, only found by the archaeologists in the late 20th century.

Fortunately, the European Beer Market stayed open until midnight and I thought it would do for dinner. So, by 10:30, I'd had a Campanian beer, a German beer, a Sicilian beer, a Tuscan beer, and a Czech beer. And a Baltimore beef sandwich, a Bavarian sausage, and a Texan pulled pork roll.

I decided it was time for bed.

Saturday

Felling a little "tired" after the night before, it was after midday before I set out. I'd worked out a route to Fontanelle Cemetery, although it wasn't marked on my phone's maps and was off the edge of my paper one.

It was only a half-hour's walk, but it took me through the much poorer Materdei district. But I didn't feel threatened or worried at all. It was almost rural.

I made one wrong turn, and toured the grounds of a church thinking "Is this it?", to the curiosity of locals, but once I got on the right road I saw a few other obvious tourists.

It was only when I got to the entrance of the huge cave that I realized I'd seen it before, on Coogan and Brydon's "Trip to Italy". They arrived by car, playing Alanis Morrisette. Thousands of skulls and long bones, but no little bits. It's not really a cemetery: properly, you'd call it an ossuary or charnel house, where exhumed bones are piled up. The custom of adopting one of the unknown dead and praying for them was banned by the church in 1969 on the grounds that it had become a superstition. There's a sign forbidding the placing of any items on or around the bones, except rosaries, which people do still leave.

On my way out, I was stalked by a chicken. I did say that it was almost rural.

I walked home, stopping to buy a pizza fritta, which I took back to the apartment for lunch. It was time to go. I wheeled my wheely suitcase across the bumpy cobbles and walked to the station to catch the airport bus. Everything ran to time; in fact, we landed in Belfast half-an-hour early. It was twenty degrees colder. Welcome home.