Guided Walking Tour
The Excavations of Pompeii are too big to be visited entirely in one day. Our guided walking tour aims to visit an example for each building type, to have an overview of the ancient Pompeii and of the Roman World at that time. Your private guide will tune to your pace and energy.
The Pompeii site extends on a surface of approximately 160 acres. To make the best of your time, Leisure Italy offers qualified guided service.
The following is a suggested itinerary for our private guided walking tour: let us know would there be any special request!
In Pompeii, you will first admire the city walls, dating back to the pre-roman Pompeii (4/5 centuries BC). One of the best-preserved ancient gates is called Porta Marina. It connected Pompeii with its port, with a path for charts and one for people.
Once in town, you will be walking on the original road made of volcanic stone. You will notice on the ground hundreds of little white spots made of travertine used to reflect torchlight (nowadays “cat’s eye” on the driving roads).
Your attention will be captured by big blocks of basalt emerging from the road: they were stepping stones used by pedestrians to avoid getting wet when it rained; in fact, unlike other Roman towns, Pompeii didn’t have a complete sewer system because the city was built on top of a lava platform that was too hard to work with.
The city centre is called Forum. It hosts all the buildings with a public function: Religion (the Temple of Apollo, the Capitolium and the Temple of the Emperor), Trade (the meat and fish market called Macellum, the textiles market headed by a priestess named Eumachia), Administration (the Basilica) and Politics (Comitia). Other facilities in the Forum included exchange offices, public restrooms and a public scale (tabula mensurae) aimed at comparing and weighing farmers’ products. In the Forum, you may also see a display of the famous human casts.
Close to the Forum were public Bath-Houses where both men and women (in different sections), poor and wealthy, free persons and slaves could access daily hygiene. Pompeii had three such complexes within the city and two others right outside of it. Each Bath-House had the following facilities: a changing room (apodyterium), a tepid room (tepidarium), a hot room (calidarium) and a Gym (Palestra).
You will notice several places fronting the road with large vases built in a masonry counter: this is what the Romans called popinae, today’s inns! These jars were full of food and beverages, and many ancient Pompeians would stop in such places for lunch.
You will recognise some of the Bakeries of Pompeii, with their ovens and grinding machines: incredible but true, some round carbonised loaves of bread were found during the excavations. Remains of ancient food, such as almonds, pine cones, figs, lentils, etc, have been discovered during the excavations, but it is hardly ever on display due to preservation reasons.
Upon request, your visit can include the infamous Lupanare (Brothel): it displays Roman frescoes featuring erotic images!
Do not miss the chance to discover Pompeii’s areas for public performances. There is an outdoor Theatre (for comedy and tragedy), an indoor theatre (Odeion, for mimes and declamation of poetry) and an amphitheatre (for games like gladiator fights or game hunting). You shall visit at least one of those places.
On request, the tour can also include the small but wonderful museum (Antiquarium), featuring finds from the excavations, as well as plaster casts made of the ancient Pompeians.
Pompeii is too big to visit entirely in a day. Leisure Italy will make sure you see the highlights.
After the tour at Pompeii, you could stop for a few minutes for a fresh-squeezed orange juice or to browse the souvenir shops if you wish.
Tour Reviews
My husband and I had a wonderful day with Giuseppe, one of the co-owners. He collected us at our hotel right on time. His vehicle was very nice and he is a good, careful driver so that was great (I have a bit of car phobia with strange drivers). I had never done a tour like this before, I was never sure it was worth it since there is so much information you can find yourself. I was very wrong. It is totally worth the price! A high quality private guided tour eliminates the “ordeal” aspect of sight seeing and travel – you really get to just relax and take in the experience. Everything is completely taken care of–tickets, scheduling, transport– so the day becomes a wonderful indulgence, with none of the “work” aspect that comes with doing it on your own. Our guide Giuseppe was perfect. He is very relaxed, knowledgeable and extremely kind. He has great flexibility- he asks what you are interested in and regularly seeks input so he can customize the tour to your interests and knowledge level. There is plenty of walking with this tour but my husband and I (65 and 60) are reasonably fit so it was no problem. The pacing of the day was great, with an amazing wine lunch in the middle (the wine was delicious but the special olive oil and vinegar from the slopes of Mt. Vesuvius was phenomenal.) I had visited Pompeii about ten years ago, using the audio guides and spent the entire day there but my understanding of the site was still slight. In the few hours spent with Giuseppe guiding us to the best spots, avoiding crowds, and providing insights and explanations I learned so much more than during my first visit. We went to the MANN archeology museum the next day which, after all of the information from Giuseppe, really helped to bring the two ancient cities to life. My only regret is that we did not have Giuseppe give us a guided tour of the museum.
Fabrizio was amazing. So accommodating and flexible. His knowledge was off the charts and he made the tour so interesting. I would highly recommend him for any tour in Italy!!!