Ruins and the beach were the theme of day 9. The travel guide mentioned ruins of the ancient greek town Elea, now named Velia, and recommended to go there not only to see the remains of the city but to enjoy the scenic countryside as well.
Again it was a rather long-winded drive following the narrow local country road across mountains and valleys. After just two hours of world class rallye driving ;-) we finally left the car in front of the historic site. There were almost no other visitors than us and the place was as scenic as promised.
Elea/Velia was once home of a couple of famous philosophers like
Zeno. I remebered the name from a book I recently bought:
Gödel, Escher, Bach (not yet finished), so it was even more interesting to me. However, one needs a lot of imagination to enjoy these old heaps of stones :-)
As promised it was a beautiful place to go for a walk. As it rises above the surrounding valley it has an amazing view above the new Italian city of Velia and along the coast.
Must be a nice place to live between the green valleys of the Cilento and the Mediterranean sea. Not really difficult to become a philospher there...
Although it was mainly cloudy the temperature was pretty high. After several hours of walking, hill-climbing and exploring the glistening sea became more and more tempting. So we left the green hills for the beach.
Again it was completely empty. A totally different view than the terribly crowded Italian beaches I was afraid of.
Feeling safe within sight of the medieval watchtower, which was erected on a hill made from stones from the ancient philosophers city,....
....a long walk along the beach helped to clear the mind of any unhappy thoughts, remaining memories of unfinished work, city noise and so on..
Probably I had many important philosophical ideas there, maybe I even found the meaning of life....unfortunately I forgot to memorize it... :-)
To appropriately finish such a great Italian day it had to be Pasta for dinner, with fresh tomatoes and green peppers.
Again it was a rather long-winded drive following the narrow local country road across mountains and valleys. After just two hours of world class rallye driving ;-) we finally left the car in front of the historic site. There were almost no other visitors than us and the place was as scenic as promised. 
Elea/Velia was once home of a couple of famous philosophers like Zeno. I remebered the name from a book I recently bought: Gödel, Escher, Bach (not yet finished), so it was even more interesting to me. However, one needs a lot of imagination to enjoy these old heaps of stones :-)
As promised it was a beautiful place to go for a walk. As it rises above the surrounding valley it has an amazing view above the new Italian city of Velia and along the coast.
Must be a nice place to live between the green valleys of the Cilento and the Mediterranean sea. Not really difficult to become a philospher there...
Although it was mainly cloudy the temperature was pretty high. After several hours of walking, hill-climbing and exploring the glistening sea became more and more tempting. So we left the green hills for the beach.
Again it was completely empty. A totally different view than the terribly crowded Italian beaches I was afraid of.
Feeling safe within sight of the medieval watchtower, which was erected on a hill made from stones from the ancient philosophers city,....
....a long walk along the beach helped to clear the mind of any unhappy thoughts, remaining memories of unfinished work, city noise and so on..
Probably I had many important philosophical ideas there, maybe I even found the meaning of life....unfortunately I forgot to memorize it... :-)
To appropriately finish such a great Italian day it had to be Pasta for dinner, with fresh tomatoes and green peppers.
