The Blue Grotto

  Capri, Italy
Monday, March 18, 2002

I have always wanted to see the Blue Grotto. It sounds so beautiful. Today we took a train to Naples and then on to Sorrento. In Sorrento we meandered through the streets following signs to the bay. I am not sure that we went the way that people normally do. We seemed to be the only ones walking down the steps toward the water. We can see the ships in the distance. We at least know that we can get to our final destination if we continue. You know some of the most wonderful moments in travel have been when I was lost. We were able to book seats on one of the boats traveling to Capri. Once we arrived we were starving so we picked up some Panini's and decadent deserts and went out onto the rocks looking out onto the sea. We sat in the warm sun eating our lunch and figuring out plans for the day.  

We bought tickets on the boat to take us to the Blue Grotto. This was where the adventure began. The Boat ride was uneventful but when the boat glided up in front of the Grotto we realized that we had to transfer from our comfy large boat into a small row boat. The German woman next to us freaked. She started yelling nein, NEIN!  at her companion. She was not going to transfer. I could understand her fear. The waves were rocking both the large boat and the small row boat. It was several feet down to the row boat and I could picture myself misjudging the motion between the two boats and ending up in the water... the very cold water. But Cory and I made it into a boat with two other people and a man that would row the boat. Our row boat rowed over to boat where the Italian Government was charging a fee for entering the Grotto and we exchanged money with them. 

Our little row boat was rowed over to a small opening in the wall of the rocks. It didn't look big enough for us to go through. The guides timed the entrance with the waves. When the water receded the people in the boat would lay back flat, the row man would grab a rope and pull the boat through the opening. Our guide misjudged the waves and the wave caught the side of the rocks and soaked Cory. Poor guy was wet the rest of the day. 

The inside of the Grotto was beautiful. The light came up from under the water illuminating the cave a beautiful Cobalt blue. I don't know if it is a prerequisite that the row man can sing but it seemed that all of the guides had voices that took advantage of the acoustics of the grotto. Our guide broke into song in Italian. Of course I don't understand Italian but I think that he was saying something about taking all the denaro of the crazy tourists. It was worth every penny or Euro. Some of the video from this trip www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCb3CTPjqgQ

Unfortunately I think Cory's accident dampened his spirits for the rest of the day but I enjoyed our walk up to the part of Capri that over looks the water. It is an amazing view. By the time that we got back down we had just missed the boat back to Sorrento so we sat down at a little Restaurant and had a fantastic dinner while watching the people of Capri go about their business. The person that waited on us chatted with us for some time and when they found out that we were celebrating our wedding in Florence he gave us flowers from one of the bouquets that were in the restaurant.

After our dinner we found a charm for my charm bracelet. The man in the store was so kind and spent quite a while to find that perfect charm for a special trip to Italy. I guess the best thing about travel for me is talking to all the people that live where we are visiting. They give insight into how very much alike we all are despite cultural, political and language differences.
The kindness of the Italian people helped us all night long. We decided to try another way of getting back to Hotel Grillo Verde. There was another stop from Naples that was called Torre Annunziata. We were sure that it would take us near Hotel Grillo Verde. We started walking and realized that we were no where near the hotel. Then we realized that we didn't know how to get back to the train station. It was getting late and Cory was tired, wet and cold.

Finally we walked into a little Cafe. We realized that we were in a very local area and couldn't speak any Italian... We did our best to communicate with the few words of Italian that we knew and pantomime. The woman behind the counter called out what must have been her 13 year old son who was taking English in school. With his limited English and our butchered Italian somehow she understood that we were lost. The boy knew where Hotel Grillo Verde was and Momma insisted that he show us out to the street, get us a Taxi and get us home. Which he promptly did.

Mr. Borelli gave us the disapproving head shake for not calling him to come pick us up and we smiled like scolded children. It made us so sad to think that we had to leave the next day. Italy has been such a wonderful place to spend our honeymoon and I am so sad thinking that it is almost over. We leave tomorrow for Rome and then we fly out.