Naples is loud, fast and generous, and it does not much care what you thought of it before you arrived. Almost a million people live in the city proper, and a good many of them seem to be on scooters, so the first rule of riding here is to pick a line and hold it. Cars stop where they like, pedestrians cross on faith, and horns are a form of conversation. It sounds worse than it is: the traffic has a rhythm, and once you find it, it flows.
The city is also one of the oldest continuously lived-in places in Europe, founded by Greeks as Neapolis and layered ever since with Roman, Norman, Angevin, Spanish and Bourbon history. Spaccanapoli cuts a dead straight line through the old town, with churches, shrines to Maradona and pizzerias along the way. This is where pizza was perfected, and a Margherita from a wood oven costs a couple of coins and weighs on the soul nicely. Add a small, strong espresso at a standing bar and you have the day's fuel for the body.
Over everything sits Vesuvius, the volcano that ended Pompeii and Herculaneum in 79 AD, and its shape is always in the corner of your eye. The ride from here goes out to the Pompeii excavations, which lie about twenty-five kilometres around the bay. You can take the coastal road through a chain of towns, or the motorway for speed, and both are busy. If you want a proper curve or two, the road up the volcano climbs a good way toward the crater rim, and the view over the gulf with Capri in the haze is worth the detour.
Practical points: do not leave anything on the bike, use a heavy chain, and park in a guarded space where you can. There is fuel all around the city and along the autostrada. Go early to Pompeii, because by noon in summer the ruins are a hot, shadeless grid of crowds, and the afternoon is better spent with a cold drink on the waterfront.