Stabian Villas near Pompeii (Villa San Marco)

[Pauline]

Has anyone been to the Stabian Villas (Villa San Marco) in the town of Castellammare di Stabia, south of Pompeii? It is the remains of a few villas that were covered by the Vesuvius eruption.

We have been to Pompeii and Herculaneum, and will spend a day at Pompeii again on this trip, but were thinking of stopping at Stabia on our drive from Naples Airport to Positano.

My hesitation is parking. We will have a car with our luggage in it and it does not look like there is a parking lot. I think you park on the street and maybe we don't want to leave our car out there.

 

[Pauline]

I've decided to not try to see this on our travel day from Naples to Positano, but instead get to Positano early.

We will drive to this site from Positano and then won't have to worry about luggage in the car. We will also visit Villa Poppea (Oplontis) which is closer to Pompeii. More about theses sites on http://www.pompeiisites.org/

 

[jonathan]

As you probably know, there are some gorgeous wall paintings from the various villas at Stabiae, which are now (I think) housed in the Naples Archaeological Museum. I didn't know these paintings when we visited there, ages ago, so didn't search them out, but there are lots of online images (most of which credit the Naples Museum).

Marcia B posted a link on FB to a NYT 36 hrs Amalfi Coast article, which mentions a villa at Minori which looks worth a visit.

 

[Pauline]

Thanks for the link to that article @jonathan . I missed it on FB. We are planning a visit to the Archaeological Museum in Naples. We were there once before, but there is a lot to see. I will look out for Villa Stabia things.

 

[Jim Zurer]

We visited one of the Stabia villas and the Villa Oplontis in 2006 when we were staying in Pompei. I believe that the Stabia villas are more developed for tourism now so there will likely be better access and information.

From my SlowTrav postings...

We visited the Villa San Marco and the Villa Oplontis at Torre Annunziata in November, 2006 and we were blown away by both of them. The wall paintings and the expanse of the villas were quite impressive and having them almost to yourselves adds to the fascination. Here are links to my reports with some pictures.

Zurers in Italy Day 11 2006 - Villa San Marco

Zurers in Italy Day 14 2006 - Villa Oplontis

I think the villas are well worth the trip but the Stabiae locations are hard to get to (as Kevin said) even by car. So if one is using public transportation, the villa in Torre Annunziata is the one to visit.

and

The villas are located on a ridge over looking the sea and it is a pretty strenuous walk uphill to both of them. There is likely a bus from the Castellammare di Stabiae station (Centro). I will say that Castellammare di Stabia centro and the surrounding area seemed to us even grittier than downtown Naples.....traffic was pretty heavy and piles of uncollected garbage were everywhere. But once you ascend the hill to the ridge, it is just a busy Italian road. Villa San Marco is actually closer to the outskirts of Gragnano than Castellammare di Stabia.

 

[Pauline]

Thanks @Jim Zurer ! I took notes from your blog posts and we will try to see both of these.