Fireworks over the Bay of Naples
This summer has been a terrible one for the firework makers of southern Italy. In a few months there have been explosions in three factories – two of them lethal.
You might think it’s a brutal cost for such fleeting wonder, but here, on the edge of the Bay of Naples, life is never steady or predictable, and the instability and flamboyance of the firework suits it well.
Ferry to Ischia with Procida in the foreground
Islands are impossible to resist. Sit for just one pizza on the seafront in the Bay of Naples and you’ll feel the pull. Capri is the big magnet but swing your eyes to the other side, away from the Sorrentine Peninsular to the opposite end of the bay, and you see Ischia with little Procida tucked between it and the mainland.
Our trip was to Ischia by ferry – a brief journey to join an afternoon sail.
The Villa Comunale in Naples
It was months before I noticed him. I drove past him every day … and yet I never looked left. There were two reasons – the first was fear, new-to-the-road fear, and the second was the light of the early sun on the sea.
The fear of the drive into Naples has almost gone, and with it the bolts of shock that thumped through my heart each time I joined the traffic into the city. Now, my spasmed eyeballs have relaxed and there’s time to enjoy the view.
The Phraser 