May 22, 2008

We woke up early to catch the boat to Capri. Salvatore met us at the hotel to wait for the Rotaract members to show up. Domenico and Max came by motorscooter because there was bad traffic on the autostrada so motorscooter was faster than car. We picked up the boat in Castellammare, it made two stops before reaching Capri. We were joined on the boat by a number of German tourists. The Italian shipmate who was serving drinks came around with bargain deals of 5 euro hats and 5 euro bags. The sales pitch was, “Special Price 5 Euros” and he actually said it in English.

Once we arrived in Capri we waited for our guide, Sascha, at Dock Zero. He found us and told us we were going to try to catch a boat tour since the Blue Grotto was closed due to rough waters. While we were waiting for the rest of Sascha’s tour group to arrive, we went to Pizzeria Buonocore. Buonocore is Martina’s grandmother’s maiden name. After ordering some breakfast, she spoke to the person behind the counter to find out who had the last name Buonocore. It turned out to be him. She told him about her family and had her picture taken with him. Nick said that the guy looked like Martina.

We then caught up with Sascha and his group to take a tour by boat around the island. The tour group was made up of English speaking visitors and Spanish speaking visitors, so he had to translate everything twice. First spot on the tour was the white grotto which is a small cave in the island. Sascha then pointed out a very high cliff and told us that Titus used to push slaves, messengers, and ex-lovers over the edge. Titus was ruler for a period and lived on Capri so during that time Capri was the capital of Italy. There were a number of large beautiful homes along the cliffs. There is a natural arch which looks like an elephant. There is a cove where teenagers take boats and go behind the rocks, but Sascha wouldn’t tell us what they did back there and Jane emphatically stated she did not want to know. On the other side of the island is a harbor which was placed there by the Romans and the ruins are still there. Today it is a private harbor. In the coral grotto, there is a waterline along the wall and just below that is the red coral. Scuba diving is forbidden so that people don’t come and steal the coral. At this point the sea started to get a bit more choppy causing a few of us to get wet, luckily it was a beautiful sunny day so we dried off quickly once we returned to port.

Sascha then told us to wait a moment while he spoke to the person who was coordinating the buses. He explained that he’d be back in two minutes, but it would be two German minutes, not two Italian minutes since an Italian two minutes is more like fifteen or twenty minutes. He told us that there is a problem if an Italian tells you, “No problem, only two minutes.” We then took a bus ride up the one road to the top of the island to a place called Anacapri. We could see the Rolex Boat Race as we squeezed up the small streets past many other buses and trucks. Once at the top of Anacapri, we were left in a high end store while Sascha went to see if we could have an early lunch. Everyone managed to slip out past Martina and she was left in the store wondering where everyone went. Luckily the group came back to find her. We sat for lunch with Domenico and Max. We had pasta as the first course. Martina and Jane didn’t have the second course which was a choice of meat or fish. Instead, Jane had an apple.

We then had a few minutes of free time to shop before we headed to Capri, the next town down. We were given some free time in Capri which the team took advantage of to do some shopping. We decided to head back to Sorrento earlier than scheduled so we could see the city. Our guides, Domenico and Max, took us around the city center and we were able to do more shopping. Jane then treated us to drinks before she, Domenico, and Max headed back to Castellammare. Jason, Nick, and Martina stayed around Sorrento and did some more shopping. They took the 6:22 train back to the hotel and had a chance to walk through Castellammare, which is a lovely town.
Stefano picked us up to take us to the Ercolano Rotary Club meeting. Stefano is a member of Rotaract and a pharmacist. At the club meeting we were treated to a presentation about advertising by a professor who created all of the advertisements in his presentation. We then exchanged flags and gifts with Antonio, the club president. Then we headed downstairs for dinner where we were treated to pasta, fish, and fruit for dessert. Stefano drove us back to Castellammare.