Trail

The trail includes the bus ride to Ercolano; but the actual hike here was merely 2 miles from close to the top of Vesuvius and around the crater. The volcano is still active and you can see why the two towns of ancient Rome were completely destroyed from the powerful explosion of 79 AD. The crater is huge and steam still belows from the vent holes all around the crater. The depth of and diameter of the crater gives you a sense of the magnitude of the 79 AD explosion. We could have walked from the Ercolano train station to the top of Vesuvio; next time we most definitely will do so. It would be lovely hike. As you see from the graphs above the maximum elevation is about 3800 feet. As you go up you see a wide trail cut through, devoid of vegetation. This is the path of the latest flow of lava caused by the eruption of 1944.