Thursday, May 25, 2017 - Fulfillment

 

When Sally and I first decided to chase Joel to Italy for his wedding and to extend the trip to 7 weeks, I knew I wanted to know a lot about Italy before I went. My first trip to Europe in 2009 was an eye opener, but I had done no research before going. Much of what I saw had no context. Knowing the background of an art object, a church, a monument or a town gives meaning to it when you experience it when traveling.  I also knew I wanted to have some ability to speak the language of the country we were visiting.  Luckily, Joel and Hailey gave us plenty of lead time to prepare.

The Italian Renaissance Art 36 part lecture series that I gave to Sally 3 years ago gave us an in depth lesson on the progression of art through the renaissance and should prove useful today as we visit the Uffizi Museum, the Bargelo and the Sante Croce Church. Reading books about the Popes ("Absolute Monarchy") and the Medici ("The Medici") and others has me excited to see the places and art they talk about.  Today, we are off to begin seeing the things we have been studying. 

The Uffizi opened at 8:15 am this morning. We were up at 6:30 am, had a breakfast of strawberries and yogurt, packed some bread and cheese for lunch and headed for the Uffizi gallery. We retraced our steps of last night to the entrance, our "Firenze" cards in hand. We arrived just as the doors opened, passed through security and walked the stairs to the top floor to begin our journey through art history. 

It was amazing to see that which we had been studying. We started with pre-renaissance alter pieces that show no perspective and worked our way into Filippo Lippi followed by Botticelli, watching the emergence of depth, perspective, realism and humanism in the art. Michelangelo and Raphael entered the mix as the renaissance reached full bloom. 

It is amazing how tiring it can be to stand and stroll through a museum!  By the time we worked our way past the end of the building overlooking the Arno River and down to the only Michelangelo free standing painting in existence (the only one he ever did), we were feeling it.  We still had two floors to go!  We worked our way down the to Raphael exhibits, then Leonardo and we were done, both with things we wanted to see and energy.  It drains both mentally and physically.

It took us three and a half hours to get through the museum, but what an amazing experience to see that which we had been studying. 

It was noon and time for lunch. Next on our list was the Bargelo Museum, known for its sculptures, but first it was twelve and time for lunch. We found a Kabob place near the church of Santa Croce for lunch and split a sandwich. 

Santa Croce was Michelangelo's church as he was growing up, and there is a lot of art and history associated with this church. We decided to tour it before we headed to the Bargelo. Also on our schedule was the Palazzi Vecchio, all in the same corner of town.

In Santa Croce are the tombs of Galileo, Dante, Machiavelli and Michelangelo along with hundreds of other lesser known souls.  We made sure we visited the four we knew, and we walked on top of scores of others as we strolled the church nave.  We also found frescoes done by Giotto in the Bardi Chapel within the church. Outside the church is the Brunelleschi Chapel, a geometrically perfect chapel, constructed using perfect squares, cubes and circles.

After paying our respects to the Santa Croce, we headed for the Bargelo.  Where Santa Croce was down on our priority list, the Bargelo was way up at the top. Inside, I knew we would see Michelangelo's Bacchus, Madonna and Child with Young Saint John, and bust of Brutus along with two of Donetello's Davids, especially the bronze one, the first free standing male nude since Roman times, over 1000 years.

We were prepared to read Rick Steves guidebook tour of the museum because we did not find an audio version in the podcast store. As we walked in and were getting prepared to mount the stairs to the second floor where we knew Donatello's David was, we met an English lady who was using an audio tour of Rick Steves that we had not found. Her iPhone had just died and she was disappointed.  I was carrying an extra battery and quickly plugged her in and began recharging.  We stood and talked for the next 10-15 minutes while it charged, comparing notes and sharing experiences. Her husband soon arrived and joined the conversation. Eventually, we unplugged and went our separate ways. She only had 15% charge, but she thought it enough to complete his tour.

We walked up the stairs of this old police station, turned right, and entered a room full of statues. There at the far end we spotted Donatello's David, the feminine looking boy poised with his foot on Goliath's head, sword in hand looking like he was ready to enter a gay bar.  Amazingly, no ropes, no plexiglas, no barriers of any kind.  You could walk right up to him on his pedestal and inspect every detail of the bronze statue. We circled and admired this 550 year old statue that had seen so much, financed by Cosimo De Medici, displayed in his interior courtyard and then handed down through history.  He inspired Michelangelo who worked as an apprentice in that courtyard and walked past the statue every day.  Here I was staring at the exact same statue. I wanted to touch the bronze and feel the details of Donatello's work, but that is the one thing you are not to do.  Docents throughout the room descend like hyenas if you do, as I witnessed with another guest. I forgot to mention, none of the other museum goers were taking notice of David.  We had him all to ourselves.

While climbing the stairs and approaching David, I quickly downloaded the audio tour of the Bargello.  When we had spent enough time swooning over David, we plugged in and returned to the entry courtyard to begin our tour.

First place we went was into the first door on the right and there was Michelangelo's Baccus, a life size male nude, drunk on wine and tipsy, with a imp wrapped around one leg munching on grapes.  This was his first full sized sculpture, completed when he was 21. Again, no barriers. You get up close, nose hovering near the marble and see the drill marks, the chisel marks, everything. And there, on the wall behind the Bacchus was his Madonna and Child. And next to that was the bust of Brutus.

Our audio tour took us back up the steps and explained more about David, and then led us to the door panels created by Ghiberti and Brunelleschi as they competed for the contract to make the doors for the Bapistry adjacent to the Duomo. Here they were, the panels each had created, on their own, to win the contract. Ghiberti won, and did such an amazing job that he was commissioned to do another set for the north doors. He spent most of his life creating these two sets of bronze door, both amazing.

How cool is it to see that panels, now 515 years old, that were the birth of the renaissance? No barriers between me and them. I could reach out and touch them as they hung on the wall. Amazing!!

If we were tired after the Uffizi, now we were dragging, although excited with all the cool stuff we had seen.  We worked our way back across the town to our B&B and collapsed in bed for a nap. We drug ourselves out of bed and decided to ride bus 12 to the Michelangelo Piazza on the hill south of town to see the sunset over the city.  I had seen the bus stop across the street from the train station when we entered town. It was only 2 blocks away.  We walked the distance and began sizing up busses.

I stuck my head in a bus that had just pulled up, yet had no number on its reader on the front.  I asked if he was bus 12.  He looked at me a minute, sizing me up, then said in broken English, "You want to go the Piazza Michelangelo?"  I said "Si!".  He said, "Come in. I will take you directly there."  Then he announced to the other 10 passengers on the bus that he was going directly to Piazza Michelangelo and if they did not want to go they needed to get off!! It took about 30 seconds for the astonished riders to realize he was serious and they exited through the open doors.  Now it was just Sally and I on the bus. He pulled out into traffic and roared up the road, dodging in and out of traffic as if he were driving a Ferrari, not a 50' long bus.  True to his word, we went directly to the piazza, and quickly. His foot was either pedal to the metal or on the brake.  Nothing in between.  We laughed and giggled at this preposterous situation as we careened through the streets of Florence, missing pedestrians and cars, parked or moving by fractions of an inch.  In the time I thought we would spend waiting for a bus, we were at the piazza.  I wished him "Gratzie Mille", a thousand thanks as we left the bus.  He smiled and zoomed away.  Wow!! That was unexpected and cool!!

We joined the throngs of hundreds in the piazza  waiting for the sunset and chatted with some kids from Toronto on a 14 day run through Europe.  We snapped our shutters with everyone else as the sun set, then walked the mile and a half back to our B&B across town.  

What a day!! We saw tons of art today, but more importantly, we understood its context, its history; why it is important in the development of the human condition.  What a day.

Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - Attitude

"The only difference between an ordeal and an adventure, is attitude."

-unknown

Piombino, the mainland town that the ferry from Elba docks at is only about a 2 and a half hour drive from Florence. We landed in Piombino at about 7:35 am, yet arrived in in Florence at 2:35 pm.  What could have taken so long?  And why did we have such a good time making the journey?

Our last morning on Elba was like our first, only 3 and a half hours earlier.  I awoke at 4:55am, just 5 minutes before the alarm was to ring to the sound of birds chirping in the trees. We had to rise at 5:00 am to take showers, stuff our last items in our bags, eat breakfast and be on the road to the ferry dock by 5:45 am. I headed to the bathroom down the hill for a shower, then back to dress and stuff my last items into my pack while Sally went through her morning routine. I headed to the community tent with my pack to fix breakfast and put our remaining food in my pack for the day's ferry and train rides to Florence.  Mark was up at 5:15 am, Sally was at the tent and together we had breakfast, although not a sit down, discuss the day's coming events type of breakfast, more of a take care of the little details while grabbing mouthfuls of food breakfast.  Mark went down to start the van and open the campground gate while Sally wrote a note of thanks and finished packing. Then it was down the hill for the last time and into the waiting van.

We said goodbye to Mark at the ferry dock and walked up the gangplank onto the waiting ferry.  It was now 6:15 am.  After an hour cruise across the early morning sunlit waters we were on the dock in Piombino at 7:35 am.   The train station is just across the road. We walked to it to check it out, then, with an hour and forty five minutes to kill before our train, we went to the ferry waiting room and read the news on the web and further planned our stay in Florence.  About 8:50 am we headed for the train station to catch our 9:20 am train. A few people gathered with us, a 40 something Austrian and his father who had been sailing in the area of Elba for a week and two Russian 20 something girls. The announcer began making periodic statements over the PA about "retardo" this and that, so we all assumed the train would be late.  By 9:50 am it was becoming apparent that something was wrong. The dad returned from outside the station to tell his son, who interpreted for us, that the train was "broken" and was not going to be coming to Piombino this morning.  

Piombino is a dead end track that connects to the main line about 10 miles away.  Apparently, there was something wrong with the track and the train was not coming down. Two taxi drivers outside the station confirmed the story. The Austrian help push the idea that we should, all six of us, take taxis to the other station at Campiglia Marittima where we could catch a train to Pisa, and then to Florence.  We piled into two taxis and quickly traversed the distance, for 40 euro, which we split with the Austrians.  A discussion with the ticket agent coaxed another 6.20 euro from us to catch the fast train to Pisa so we could catch an earlier train from there to Florence. It was now 10:20 am.  The next train to Pisa came at 12:09 pm, if it was on time, which the ticket agent said was rare, as it was coming all the way from Sorrento.

Sally and I had lunch; bread, cheese, nectarines and a salad left over from dinner last night, while seated on the benches at the train station.  We filmed an instructional video on how to use the automated toilet system and generally just had a good time.  We moved to "binario due", platform 2, and caught our train to Pisa, only 5 minutes late.

Checking the schedule via the web, we saw that our "fast train" was late enough to cause us to miss our 1:10 pm connection at Pisa, unless it was late as well.  We disembarked at Pisa a few minutes late for the 1:10 pm train, but scurried between the 9 binari, hoping it had not left.  It had. The next train to Florence left at 1:35 pm from binario 9, so we settle onto that platform and waited.

Once on board the train to Florence, we were seated across the aisle from a couple from Ohio, and had a good time comparing experiences.  They had taken a cruise from Naples to the Greek Islands for a week, making about 6 stops along the way.  They were amazed to see what little we had for a 7 week trip. They had four massive suitcases, although it must be remembered they were on a cruise where the clothing requirements are a bit steep compared to bumming around Italy via train. They were staying at Hiltons while traveling, enjoying the exercise rooms, English speaking attendants and the "American" style amenities. They were a little repulsed by the descriptions of our camping experience and Air B&B accommodations.  Still, they were warm and friendly people and we enjoyed our time with them.

We arrived in Florence at 2:35 pm.  From the train station we walked out to the back of the Santa Maria Novella church, took a number at the information kiosk, and soon were purchasing our Firenze Passes at 72 euros each to allow us into all the museums for "free" and to bypass the ticket lines.  

Our B&B room was only about 2 blocks from the station, so we began working our way there.  We bypassed it at first, then, with helpful directions from a shoe shop worker, found our way.  The owner was waiting for us at the door.  He had us try our keys in the courtyard outer door, then the gate. The building is right on a very busy street, with traffic thundering by. I wondered how loud our room would be. He offered to have Sally and i ride up in the elevator together and he would follow with our luggage, as the elevator was a tight fit for two. My antenna perked up, sensing danger. We get in the elevator, the doors close and we start up while someone makes off with all our stuff. I politely and quickly said I would carry our stuff up the three floor and he and Sally could ride up together, and started mounting the stairs before he had a chance to object. You might be wondering, "Did he look dangerous?"  Not in the least, in fact, he seemed a very kind and gentle man. Still, I was new in the city and did not want to leave my stuff with someone I had met 3 minutes earlier, even if he had just handed me keys and made me test them in the locks and was under the scrutiny of all the Air B&B users out there. 

When I reached the third floor (4th floor for Americans. The Italians start counting floors with the one above the ground floor.) I turned around to see he had followed me up the stairs and had let Sally use the elevator by herself. He was a big guy and perhaps he and Sally would have been an awkward and uncomfortable fit. He pointed me to the door of our room. I opened it to find a beautiful room. Wood floors, everything meticulously color coordinated in soft shades of pale green, spotless bathroom and nice additions such as antique desk/table and coat rack. Super nice! It was on the backside of the building and was dead quiet. I complimented him on the room and expressed great joy at seeing it. He seemed pleased, and then was gone. 

We took showers and prepared to head out. We planned to do the Rock Steves walking tour of Florence, to orient ourselves within the city and get a good overview. Our room is only a block from the Duomo, so we headed there first, except we were hungry, having spent the day in train stations and trains. We had a hankering for some Kabab sandwiches. Using google maps we found our way to a shop. A quick meal and we were back on our mission. 

I have read so much about the Duomo of Florence, watched movies, seen photos, listened to lectures,  etc. that it was a thrill to see it for real. We walked up to it and the adjacent baptistery and soaked in the grandeur. To quote the four ninja turtles named after the renaissance masters, "Totally awesome dude!" I headed straight for the baptistery doors, starting on the north side, the original work of Ghiberti. Of course, the ones here are copies, the real ones are in the Duomo museum now, but still, what a treat to see. These are the panels that kicked off the renaissance, that inspired all artists that followed. 

We circled around to the east side to see the second set of doors Ghiberti conceived and produced. Fantastico!!

After half an hour of gawking, we donned our headsets and listened to Rick Steves walking tour of Florence. It took us about two hours to get through the 50 minute tour as we stopped and marveled at sculptures and buildings. We finished up on the Ponte Vecchio, took a quick walk to the Pitti Palace, then returned back to the Duomo. A quick trip to a grocery store a few blocks away for breakfast supplies and we were back in our room, me writing the blog and Sally listening to "The Agony and the Ecstacy". What an awesome day!!

A train track leading too nowhere-Piombino train station

Tuesday, May 23, 2017 - Last day on the Island

Who came up with the idea that all good things must come to an end?  I mean, really?  Do they have to?  I remember as a kid dreading the day summer camp ended or the day we had to leave San Juan Island and then bemoaning the loss of such a wonderful experience, wondering "why did it have to end?"  I think it was when doing the PCT three years ago that I finally embraced the concept of "Be glad it happened, not sad it is ending."  Even though they are only words, they convey a powerful idea.  Be glad it happened.  Exactly!  My life is richer for having it happen.  Be glad for the opportunity.  Today, that philosophy came into play as we came to grips with the reality that it was our last full day on Elba, and we really wanted to stay longer.

I got up about 7:00 this morning, went out to the community tent, sat and blogged while Sally slept in.  Mark soon got up, awakened by the campground maintenance crew riding into our site on his golf cart to empty the garbage and recycling. Sal arose about 9:00 am.  Our usual of hard boiled eggs, yogurt, strawberries, banana's was great.  

We put on our bathing suits and headed for the sandy beach.  The beach has a very gradual slope. One must walk about 50 yards from the shore before the water reaches to your crotch. It is a great beach for little kids because the water is shallow for such a long ways.  We both swam, although I did not stay in long. Cool water such as this causes my Raynod's syndrome in my hands to go bonkers, cutting off the blood to my fingers if my body temperature gets too cold.  I returned to the beach to lie in the sun and read, while Sally continued to swim. Eventually, she returned to the beach, but not before she asked me to shoot some images of her swimming in the Mediterranean.

Our plan was to eat lunch at the same restaurant as two day earlier, but when we mounted the deck, we saw the place was full of German tourists from a tour bus.  We decided to walk to the pebble beach and check it out, hoping to see some new territory and kill time until the Germans vacated the restaurant. On our way to the other beach we spotted Mark and Robin carrying mops and scrub buckets.  Talking to them, we found they were down to scrub some vinyl banners, part of the get ready for summer chores they are working on daily.

Back at our restaurant, the Germans were starting to clear out, so we took a seaside table and soon enjoyed lunch-Greco salad, a repeat from Sunday and baked pizza crust with olive oil and basil.  Yummy.

We walked to the swimming pool at the campground, an outrageously large and beautiful pool. Sally swam while I rested, even falling asleep a few times.  Then it was back to the campsite to do a preliminary packing, make dinner and get ready to leave tomorrow morning-early.  

About 8:00 pm Mark mentions that he wants to go down to the beach to get an ice cream, as Robin ate the last one they had.  He wonders aloud if he should walk or take a mountain bike.  I voice the opinion he should take a bike, quicker and more fun.  I offer to ride down with him.  A gelato sounds good.  He takes me to a big tent that turns out to be a garage where a couple dozen really nice aluminum framed mountain bikes are stored.  After Mark spends a few minutes digging around for the key, we are on our way, navigating the steep gravel road off the hill where the campsite is down to the road and off to the Gelato stand. Mark recommended a fig flavored scoop with walnuts.  It was good.  After the Gelato, we rode up the paved road for 15 minutes until we had to turn around to make it back to the campsite by dark.  Grinding up the steep gravel back to the site was fun. Now I wish I had rented a bike for half a day and gone riding.  Super nice area to ride and great bikes.

We have to be on the 6:30 am boat off the island, so we have to leave the camp at 5:45 am. While I wrote, Sally spent time talking with Katerina, Ester and Robin.  About 9:30 pm we bid them goodbye and headed for bed.  5:00am comes early.  What a great relaxing day!

Monday, May 22 - Scooting around the Island

Okay, we had a day of rest yesterday.  We just laid around the beach doing nothing.  Time to get back on the horse and cover some territory-however this horse is a Honda.  Mark told us that the campground we are a part of, "Lacona Campground", rents motor scooters for 30 euro a day.  Today, we are going out to see the countryside.  

The last time I rode a motorized two wheeled vehicle was before Andy was born, 35 years ago.  But, I spend a lot of time on the unmotorized cycle, so I figured the transition should be easy.  As a good friend of mine is known to say, "What could possibly go wrong?"

We got up a little earlier than yesterday, about 7:00 am, showered, ate breakfast and walked down the hill to the camping registration window by 8:45 am.  It is so nice to be here before the high season.  The campground is empty, yet the weather is perfection. It gets down to 65º at night and all the way up to 75º during the day.  The water of the Mediterranean is perfect for swimming. There was no one at the campground office.  The lady is sweet and patient. It took about 10 minutes to photocopy my drivers license and give me quick instructions on how to operate what looks like a brand new scooter.  To be safe, I took a quick run down the block without Sally on the back to be sure I had the hang of things.  All systems go.  We put our pack with swim suits, iPad, towels and other necessities in the box behind the seat, Sally climbed on between me and box and we were off.

First stop, Napoleon's summer home about 8 miles away, up over a pass.  We cruised through the outskirts of Portoferraio, then head to his palace.  We had checked their website yesterday to be sure they were open on Mondays, but when we pulled into the empty parking lot we suspected something was up.  We parked the scooter and walked up to the driveway that leads 100 yards to the palace.  A elderly woman with serious dental decay but a sweet and warm smile told us the palace was "chiuso".  We looked up to the palace to see the gates closed and locked.  Bummer.  We walked up to the palace gates and eyed Napoleon's home.  The kind women also told us his winter home, the one that overlooks the sea was open "lunedi e chiuso martedi".  Surprisingly, I understood her!  Open on Monday and closed Tuesday.  We decided to visit his other home across town in Portoferraio.  

We returned to the Honda scooter, donned our helmets, Sally climbed on, I inserted the key, applied the left hand brake as instructed, pushed the start button . . .  and nothing happened. Hmmmm. We fiddled with it for 5 minutes, to no avail.  Mark had warned us that he and Robin had had the same trouble when they rented it a week ago.  We tried pulling both breaks, the key in different positions, lights on and off . . . pretty much every combination of switches possible, without success.  We were stuck.  I texted Mark to ask for any hints he might have.  While waiting for his reply, I noticed a little lever sticking up that operated a disc of metal that covers the key hole, I assumed to keep the water out.  Maybe that would help.  I closed it. When I tried to reverse the closing . . .  It would not open.  Great. Now I could not even get the key in the ignition!  We pushed the scooter over to the gift shop in the parking lot and asked the owner if he could help us.  He repeated all the moves we had made, except inserting the key which was impossible now that I had blocked the keyhole with the secondary locking device. Mark responded that he had no ideas but that he could come pick us up if we were unable to figure it out.  At least we had a backup.

As I fiddled with the key trying to pry the cover off the key hole I noticed a hexagonal shape in the plastic of the key that matched perfectly the hexagonal hole that covered the keyhole.  When I applied it to the hole, voila!, the keyhole cover moved out of the way and we had access to the keyhole again!  With the gentleman's help, we inserted the key and repeated all the actions of the first 15 minutes with the same effects; the scooter just sat there.  Frustrated I decided to push the scooter to another part of the parking lot.  Straddling it, I kicked the kickstand up . . .  and a thought popped into my head; could the kickstand being down keep it from starting?  We had not tried that. I turned on the key, gripped the left hand brake and pushed the starter button. It came to life!!  Wow. Thirty minutes to figure that out. I texted Mark to tell him we were up and running, but the message would not go out. Now I feared he would come for us unnecessarily.  We boarded the beast and headed for Napoleon's other home across town, hoping our signal would go out from that location.

I guess we should have been a little scared about driving through Portoferraio, certainly not a major city, but full of Italian drivers. We had learned a bit about their ways from the pedestrian's point of view while in Rome.  They don't stop if you look timid.  The only way to get across a street is to walk out into the street and make them stop for you, which they will, but as soon as you are past their bumper they zoom by, missing you by inches.  We also watched the scooters weaving in and out of traffic with no regard for traffic lights, lines or stop signs.

I applied what I had learned through observation into practice in Portoferraio, although with Sally on the back I was not aggressive at all.  This meant we were constantly being passed by cars and motorcycles. The city had one of those radar signs that states what speed you are going along side the road as you pass by with the speed limit of 35 Km/hr posted right below it.  I watched cars flit by with the electronic sign reading 75.  I registered a 45, not wanting to seems like too much of an out-of-towner.

Sally sat on the back with Google Maps running on the iPhone as I navigated traffic, she yelling out rights and lefts as we followed its directions to Napoleon's villa.  We made a few wrong turns which we quickly rectified, but Google thought we could ride our steed up stairs and we soon were in a 4 foot wide alley wiggling through town, unable to find a route to his house up on the hill.  After going the wrong way on a one way street, we parked the scooter and walked up those stairs to his villa.

I have read about about 6 books about Napoleon, so getting to his house was a goal and a treat.  We have found the island and now found his house wonderful and questioned why he would want to leave, but his ego was too big for such a small place. We paid our 5 euros each and toured the house and the grounds before returning to the scooter and continuing our ride across the island.

Mark had suggested we ride to the southwest side of the island due to its beautiful coastline and to visit Marina di Campo for a quaint Italian seaside town. We found Mark's recommendations were spot on.  We had lunch at a restaurant in Marina di Campo and enjoyed the small town. From there we headed out on the southwest coast, the road right above the water with small towns tucked into the coves between the points.  We stopped at one particularly picturesque town, Cavoli.  To get down to the beach you must wait for the uphill traffic to come past as the road is only one lane wide.  A stop light at both ends controls the flow, and the Italians respect the light.

We continued down the road another 5 miles, then made a U-turn to head for home, but first we stopped at Cavoli beach and had a swim.  It was fun to swim in the warm Mediterranean waters and enjoy this small, but popular beach.  Again, it was nearly vacant, but photos on the snack shop wall showed the beach covered shoulder to shoulder with thousands of bathers during a special weekend.

After our swim, we motored back along the coast, through Marina di Campo and up over the ridge into Lacona where our campground is.  We had hoped to fill the scooter with gas, but found the closest gas station was in Portoferraio. I dropped Sally at the campground, then soloed it up over the mountain and down into Portoferraio. It took a while to find a gas station, and in my weaving around town looking for one I began to worry I could find my way home, especially because my iPhone was down to 2% battery. 

I found an Exxon station and the attendant filled me up, 1.5 liters and $2.50, for an entire day of riding.  I stopped at "Conrad's Supermercato" and found Pepsi for Sally and green beans. With my prizes stored under the seat of the scooter, I motored back to the campground and turned in the scooter.

Back at camp I found Sally reclining in the community tent, talking with Mark and Robin.  We had a dinner of fried potatoes and onions, green beans and an apple, then talked with Mark, Robin, Ester and Katarina until 9:00 pm when we crawled into our cots and called it a day. That was a great day!!

Sunday, May 21, 2017 - Island Life

Most people who live on an island speak of "island time". Everything moves a little slower. Schedules might be made, but rarely kept. Somehow you linger a little longer here, take a little more time there and the day glides past. 

When we decided to come to Elba back in January, we were not thinking of "island time". We had getting away from our hectic schedule in the Rome and seeing Napoleon's banishment island on our minds. But now that we have been here a day, "island time" is a factor and it fits well with our goal of taking a "vacation from our vacation".

Today we slept in until 8:30 am, lounging around in our separate bunks in our tent, listening to the birds chirping in the thick foliage and the surf pounding on the beach. While Sally slept, I put together a 14 day road trip for our new acquaintances, Victor, Velda and Zack Sosah. San Francisco to Yosemite to Death Valley to Vegas to The Grand Canyon to Bryce and Zion to Tahoe and back to SF. I knew it was not perfect, but it gave me a chance to see mileages and the timing of their trip. I sent a note to Zack on messenger saying we would love to meet them later in the day if it worked for them. 

Sally and I wandered the 100' from our tent tucked in the corner to the community tent to say good morning to Mark, then walked over the hill to the bathrooms, a 50 yard walk away, to settle the morning accounts. Back at the community tent, we sliced up fresh strawberries and bananas to mix with Yogurt for breakfast and talked with Mark as we ate. He outlined his jobs for the day and we mused about what we might do. Sally began looking over the plan I had made for the Sosah's road trip and we modified it to meet what she perceived as their desires based on our conversations of the day before on the ferry. It was now 11:30 am and we had not heard back from them, so we began to wonder if our planning was for nothing. We began to talk of a walk to the sandy beach when a message came in from Zach saying they would love to meet. We said we had a lazy day with no commitments and we would work around their schedule. Response time was a little slow, which we attributed to Ghana culture, so we headed for the beach, iPad in hand to allow us to continue to communicate with them. 

On the way to the beach, we walked through this rural beach area. We passed a small fruit stand with an adojacent restaurant. In front was parked a beautiful 72 VW van/pickup painted bright orange. Of course we stopped to talk to the owner, who uses the van as a mobile selling platform for his T-shirt business. 

We rounded the corner with the sculpture/pottery yard and we were approaching the beach and its seaside businesses; a restaurant, snack bar and such.  Just past these we found a gorgeous sandy beach about half a mile long. We wadded out in the Mediterranean waters and found them very warm, at least by Washington standards for salt water. We strolled the length of the beach and exited on the far end, found our way back onto the road and began working our way back. 

It is the low season right now. The infrastructure for large crowds is in place, but there is nearly no one here. There might have been 25 on the beach. We stopped into a "Supermercato" for groceries and found bare shelves and an elderly Italian woman asleep. Maybe in a few weeks . . .

We took a narrow road back to the beach and returned to the restaurant for lunch. We both had salads, Sally the Mediterranean and I the Greek. No lettuce. Artfully arranges vegetables and Feta cheese. Delicious. 

By now Zack and family had texted to say they were finishing lunch and on their way in a bit, maybe an hour out. We headed back to the campsite, rushed a shower and then sat near the campground entrance. To help them find the entrance, I photographed Sally at the gates and took a screenshot of our location on Google Maps and texted it to them. There are about four entrances to the campground and I thought this would help them. They arrived about 4:30 pm. 

We had a nice late afternoon sitting at a table in the campground outdoor snack bar getting to know them better and outlining their trip. Where we had thought they were flying in and out of San Francisco, we found they were leaving from Vegas, a vast improvement in planning. After getting to know them better, we were able to put together a trip more suited to their likes (Vegas, inexpensive hotels) and dislikes (tents, camping). 

Too soon, they had to leave. They were headed off the island early tomorrow morning, and flying home from Pisa about 10:30 am, Zack back to London, Victor and Velda to Ghana. 

We walked back to the campsite, had a repeat dinner of the night before, pasta, broccoli and cheese while Mark and Robin had a delicious looking rice dish. Katerina and her daughter Ester soon came in and we all ate in shifts as our food finished cooking, talking travel plans, home life, politics and life in general. While chatting, I typed on the iPad, completing the details to their trip.

Sally and I made plans to rent a motor scooter tomorrow and tour the island. We were in bed by 10:00 pm. What a great day!!

Saturday, May20, 2017 - Of Italian Trains and Italian Language

`My master plan to honor the Italian people by learning their language and using it whenever possible is having its ups and downs. If I know I am going into a situation, such as talking with a ticket agent about my train ticket, I can rehearse what I want to say and deliver it with a fair amount of accuracy and nearly correct grammar.  This seems like a great idea, but there is a problem.  The recipient of my delivery thinks I know Italian and begins to talk back to me in rapid fire verse.  I have no idea what he/she is saying and have to ask for an English interpretation.  This happened this morning at the train ticket booth.  I wanted to ask if our train was going to be late.  I rehearsed "Il treno a Pisa retardo?", asking if the train would be late.  My diction and word choice was good enough that he thought I was Italian and started to explain something to me.  I had to confess that I spoke only a little Italian, "Io Parlo piccolo Italian".  He switched to broken English and I was able to find out that, for now, it was on time.

What had prompted me to ask the question?  While seated on the platform waiting for our train to carry us to Piombio where we would catch a boat to the Island of Elba, we were next to an Italian woman in her late 60's, very nicely dressed. Sally asked her where she was headed.  She spoke no English. I asked her "Dov'e Albita, Lei?"  Where do you live? She answered, "Abito in Roma." I could not remember the verb for "going to", so out came the iPhone and Google Translate.  

As we struggled to communicate, both with smiles on our faces, enjoying the process, a young man of about 16, overhearing our attempt at a conversation, began to interpret for us. He was talking English in school and did a good job of crossing the language barrier and helping me with some Italian words.  We found out she was headed in the same direction as we were, to the town of Grosso, about two stops before ours.  This was good, because now we knew to follow her onto the train. We also found out that during the thunderstorm of the night before a fire had occurred in the Termini train station in the center of Rome and all the computers that displayed arrival times were down, causing delays on most trains.

About 20 minutes before our train was scheduled to arrive, our interpreter boarded a train and was gone.  A few minutes later the announcer said something in Italian that caused our lady to groan and frown. She looked at me and said, "Dieci minuti retardo!"  This I got.  Ten minutes late.  By now, the thunderstorm of last night had returned and the rain was falling heavily accompanied by thunder and lightning. Glancing down the covered platform, I saw the computer display had awakened. I walked down to see that next to our train, #11885, there was a 10' under the "Ret" heading.  Ten minutes retardo.

I returned, and a few minutes later the announcement came "Treno undici Otto Otto cinque venti minuti retardo."  This time I actually understood the train was now 20 minutes late. This was enough for Sally who had been needing to use the restroom, but was waiting to do so on the train.  She made a dash for the station bathroom, returning with plenty of time.  Twenty minutes later, our train did indeed rumble into the station. We boarded and were on our way north toward Campagnia Marittima where we would switch trains to get to Piombino and the ferry to Elba.

The ride was very comfortable. We had about a two hour and a half hour ride. I amused myself by checking the trains speed with my GPS app (50 mph) and watching our progress along the line on Google Earth. We had stocked up on groceries for the island, bread, pasta and cheese, so we had a little lunch on the train.

At Grosso, our sweet lady said "Arrivaderci" and exited our car to the passageway at the end and hence out onto the platform. A few moments later she burst through the door yelling excited,  "Como si apre la porta!?!?"  I had no clue what she was saying even though her eye pleaded with us for help.  She repeated herself and two Italians behind us rushed to her aid and opened the outer train doors for her before the train left the station so she could exit the train.  It typed into Google translate what she had said in Italian, after the fact, and discovered the reason for her fear.  She thought the train would leave the station before she could get off.

At Campagnia Marittima we left the train on "binario 2", platform 2. We found our connection to Piombino on the display screen to be leaving in 15 minutes from binario 3, so we seated ourselves for the wait.

Once in Piombino we walked to the bigletteria to buy our tickets for the ferry to Elba. Once secured, had a Coke in the waiting room, then walked across the parking lot to dock #5 when we saw our massive "ferry" coming into port.

On board, we settle into a very posh restaurant in the bow, had some popcorn and a sandwich while seated at a table, then moved to the bar at the front windows to watch the progress of the ship. We could see Elba in the distance through the water streaked windows. Even though we were 30 feet above the waterline, the wind blowing strongly was whipping up waves and they were throwing spray to the upper decks as we pounded across the Mediterranean.

There was a family of three to our right and Sally started up a conversation with them.  They were from England, although originally for Ghana. Victor, Velda and their son Zach. Zach is 22 and had just finished Law School in England with plans to become a solicitor.  Victor is a businessman dealing with energy and Velda was a realtor, both having returned to Ghana 8 years earlier. They are super sweet people and we instantly took a liking to them. 

Soon we discovered they were coming to Yosemite and were looking for ideas. Sally and I relish the chance to evangelize about the wonders of Yosemite and soon we were advising them about what to see.  The boat was beginning to dock at Elba and we all had to rush to our exits. They had driven their rental car onboard and had to rush to the car deck, us to the doors on the deck below. Before parting, Zach and I exchanged V-cards, virtual address cards with all our information, agreeing we would get together on the island to talk more about their trip and what to see.

Once on the ferry dock, we texted Mark to let him know we were on the island and needed a ride to our campsite for the night.  He messaged back that it would take him 20-25 minutes to drive to the dock from the camp. This was perfect for us, as we saw a supermarket just down the road and walked to stock up on supplies of fresh fruits and vegetable to complement our pasta.

Once we had connected with Mark, we began the drive back across the island to "Camp Lacona" on the south side. Mark is 29, from the Netherlands, with a degree in social work.  He is a traveler, having been in Indonesia working with autistic and ADHD kids before he took this job on Elba running helping run the camp. He is quick to smile, very kind and adventurous.

The camp is at the neck of a peninsula, up on a hill above a campground. On the walk up the hill from the parking area amongst the trees we stopped at the bathrooms. He said there was a good view from here. The bathrooms are spotless, and true to his word, from the upper deck where the sinks are is a spectacular view of the beaches on either side of the peninsula, a sandy beach to the southwest, and a rock beach to the northeast.

On top of the hill he showed us to our tent tucked down in a corner. The camp accommodates 80 in tents and caters to school groups, although half their clients now come via Air B&B. We are ahead of the high season, so it is just Sally and I, Mark and his assistant Robin, a 22 years old beautiful and delightful girl from the Netherlands and a German woman, Katarina, and her 23 year old daughter, Ester, staying for 10 days.

There is a commons area tent, probably 15 feet by 30 feet with refrigerators, gas hot plates, sound system, tables, benches, two comfy chairs, racks for storing food, kitchen utensils and silverware for 80 and then tents scattered down the hill amongst the trees to accommodate 80. The wind was blowing strongly as we arrived, and Mark gave us a quick orientation to the use of the common area and kitchen in the tent.  Soon we were boiling water for pasta, broccoli and cheese for dinner as Mark and Robin cooked next to us in the cozy tent, lively conversation about goals, aspirations, past experiences and more floating through the air along with the smells of cooking dinner.

What a delight!!  We had high expectations of this tent experience on Elba, and it was living up to them all. We put some Pink Floyd on the sound system, enjoyed our dinner, then relaxed and continued our conversations. Mark and Robin cooked a mound of potatoes that could have fed 20, mashed them up with herbs and spices, fried up 5 hamburger patties and a quart of string beans and were soon devouring most of it.

The wind continued to buffet the tent as the sun set and we headed to our tent for the night. Fitted sheets were already on the mattresses of the bunk beds. We had to put the duvet covers on the quilts. With a power cord sneaking in through the back of the tent attached to a power strip, we plugged in the light so we could see, plugged in our iPad and phones to charge and then unplugged the light to sleep.  This is going to be fun.