Sperlonga – simply magical

Hello hello! I’m back to tell  you about our DAY 3 which was a day-trip from Rome to this magical town named Sperlonga. This was by far the most relaxing day but we still had some little adventures on this day too, no worries^^

So, let’s start properly. Why Sperlonga? I’ve heard about this little town from my good friend @ipiripinapa and fell in love with it immediately as her photos were absolutely gorgeous. I knew I had to see it for myself as soon as possible!

So this was a perfect occasion to visit this amazing town. Sperlonga is pretty close to Rome, 2 hours by train + bus, from Termini Central Station. The train ticket costs 7 Euros one way.

• you need to take the Roma – Napoli (Naples) train;
• the stop you need to get off at is Fondi;
• once off the train, you catch the bus just outside the train station to get to Sperlonga for a whopping 1 Euro and 12km later, you’re there.

So said, so done! We were in Fondi at around 12 PM and waiting for the bus. In 10 minutes or so, a bus arrived, but the driver didn’t speak English at all, so we were unable to understand each other properly. However, he said something about coming back for Sperlonga in 30 minutes, because he was now reaching other destination. Or that’s what I thought he said.

OK, no problem. We’ll wait of course. Everything looked so nice and peaceful until some immigrants started to hover around and kind of staring at us. There was absolutely nobody else in the station so we were a little bit discomforted about the situation.

However, while we were waiting, look what a cute pink FIAT found there. This is just for the girls, you guys imagine this is a black tuned Lamborghini or something, haha.

We were inside the railroad station for 5 minutes to get some crackers from a vendor machine and I think, I THINK, I am not sure… but I think the bus we were waiting for might have passed through the station and left.

Those 30 minutes the driver said to wait, turned into 60 minutes and we were becoming quite anxious now. The immigrants were still there of course. Meh

After awhile, the bus came once again. The same driver told us (well he did not tell us, he showed us on a timetable inside the bus) that he would return in the station to take us to Sperlonga at 3:40 PM or something. Say WHATTT???? It was only 1 PM. We just couldn’t believe this… We were stuck in that railroad station with all those immigrants around. AWESOME. Also, being late November, the sun was setting at around 5 PM, so we were quite in a hurry because we wanted to explore Sperlonga as much as we could by daylight of course. However, please keep in mind that we were traveling off-season, this is why the bus was running at such big intervals.

Then, an italian guy approached us and asked if we want to take a taxi. Yeah, sure. “How much?” I asked. He said 20 Euros and it was no taxi, it was just his own car out there, an old Ford Focus as I recall. We told him it was too much, he then said 15 Euros. Hmm, I looked around, there was still nobody in the station so I was sure we could lower the price a bit. We said 10 Euros. But nooo, he wanted 15. Oh well, in this case we just told him that we cannot afford paying 15 Euros for this ride and politely refused. But then, THEN he accepted. YAY

I have to tell you… while we were heading to his car, I started being a little paranoid thinking that maybe those immigrants called this guy and now he is going to rob us and just leave us somewhere around the area without any money left. I have a big imagination, I know haha. But things turned out to be just fine. The italian guy was really friendly and he even played some romanian music in his car especially for us^^. So after 15 minutes, we were finally there. Hurray!

There are two areas in the town – the lower section (to the north) and the old town area… this is where we got off.  Simply, just amazing! The white buildings, fuchsia bougainvillaea and colored doorways reminded me of Greece. Little restaurants, shops and cafes scattered through the little alleys and walkways of this hilltop town.

You don’t believe me? I’ll just show you then. This is the lower part of the town.

And this is the old town area. Wonderful, right?

Romans “discovered” this place at the end of Republican period, and built magnificent villas. They were attracted by the beauty of this coast and by the mild climate. The name of Sperlonga comes from the presence of several natural caves, called “speluncae” in Latin. After the fall of Roman Empire, local populations used the ruins of the imperial residence, around VI century, as a refuge. They were the first inhabitants of Sperlonga and the village was developing along S. Magno hill. They escaped from the illnesses of the marshes and pirates’ invasions.  Uhhh, pirates.

And now, let me take you on a stroll into this beautiful town. Hope you’ll enjoy it! But first, GELATO! And the award for the best ice-cream in the world goes to… Italy of course!

Cute panties! HA HA HA

What did I tell you about fuchsia bougainvillaea? Finding these beauties at the end of November was really extraordinary!

Oh, and cats. Lots of beautiful cats were all around Sperlonga. They were really big ones!

Below is “Torre Truglia” which was built by the Spanish in the 16th century as a look-out tower against the Turks.

After exploring this old part of the town, we went down to the beach to admire the sunset and also the Tyrrhenian Sea (part of the Mediterranean Sea off of the western coast of Italy and the east coast of Sardinia).

Now imagine yourselves living here forever and see this sunset every evening from your bedroom window. Not bad huh?

This is the old part of the town seen from the beach. Quite breathtaking!

After all this walking, what can you do more? Well, walk a little bit more of course haha. So we wandered the lower part of the city as well. There are many hotels, pretty restaurants and shops to buy souvenirs. I bet Sperlonga is quite a blast in the summertime!

But eventually, we had to leave Sperlonga and go back to Rome that day. So we went to the bus station up the hill in the old part of the town and while we were waiting for the bus, we had 2 sandwiches and 2 beers because we were really really hungry. We received 2 slices of pizza on the house. Super nice, right?

This was such a beautiful and relaxing day, and Sperlonga, you were indeed MAGICAL! Hope to see you again soon!

Until next time,

Andreea.

• Our day-trip to Sperlonga: 27.11.2016
• Train ticket from Rome to Fondi: Trenitalia 7 Euros per person
• Bus ticket from Fondi to Sperlonga: 1.20 Euro per person