Nice to Naples 28th June 2003
We are finally moving into Italy and I am afraid will demonstrate an awful
ignorance of classical history but here goes...
About 20 miles east of Nice is Monte Carlo (Monacco), once a poor independent
monarchy, started in 1308 when the Grimaldi family bought it from Genoa – then
in the 1800’s they were so poor they had to sell half of the country [Roquebrune
and Menton] to France; they started the casino in 1857 to pay off the remaining
debts.
The sea between Nice and Monacco/Monte Carlo is a marine equivalent of a
motorway without a central divide, with lots of large motor boats charging up
and down the coast in all directions producing a wildly turbulent sea especially
as they tend to drive their boats like dodgems, ie swerving wildly at the least
opportunity except when they are heading straight at you, when they stay
straight until the last minute….
The wind was a fresh 25 knots, so were pleased to get to Monacco’s marinas, but
they were full (or at least they rather ungraciously said they were – Nice had
been charming, Monacco much less so), so we returned to Villefranche, a huge bay
just east of Nice in a near gale, and anchored, along with a few super yachts
and cruise liners. Anchoring is as much an art as science; after many arguments
(along the lines of ‘If you had only dropped the anchor when I said, we would
not have ended up 2 metres from this other yacht….’) we have learnt to adopt a
no-blame approach, and that you often have to have more than one attempt to get
the anchor wedged in tightly, especially if the sea bottom is weedy or flat
rocks. And so it proved, by midnight the wind was a full gale and more, boats
all round the anchorage were drifting, the French marine Red Cross were
heroically helping 3 boats all sending out Maydays (in grave and imminent
danger), and our anchor started to drag. Not a comfortable feeling when there
are rocks 30 metres behind where you are sleeping (or at least trying to sleep).
However anchors that drag can also catch again, and are often then stronger than
before, and so it proved. We stayed up in watches throughout the remainder of
the night, checking our position, and in the morning were in the same place
watching other larger boats circling round trying to re-anchor. The forecasters
predicted more gales, so we stayed put while the wind steadily …..decreased to a
nice 10 knots and stayed there. Weather forecasts in the Med are as likely to be
wrong or on strike as they are to be right, which makes for frustrating days
In a fit of pique, we sailed straight past Monacco to San Remo, the first large
town in Italy as you go east along the Med. San Remo is a bit like an ageing
society lady fallen on hard times - you can see that it used to be glamorous,
but now its largely a place for people from Milan etc to buy slightly passe
designer goods 30% cheaper. San Remo’s heyday was when a lot of white Russian
aristocrats fled in 1917 with jewels etc and many arrived at San Remo. There is
a beautiful Russian orthodox church built at this time; also a casino, which I
guess reflects the 2 approaches to losing their status and position – gambling
and religion. The casino now mirrors the town, faded elegance, slightly
threadbare carpets, anxious clients wanting to get rich. We went in to look,
spent 30 minutes losing our stake, and retreated to the boat.
You might think that countries in the EU would be converging. From our
experience there is not a lot of evidence for that. To take just one example,
whereas Spain has lots of new marinas and harbours built with EU funds, Italy
seems to have avoided this altogether, and there are whole stretches of coast
line with no port at all. However a number of the ports that do exist are porto
comunale, and a harbour wall somewhere for boats to moor up for free, provided
you can show your insurance certificate in Italian.
We had arranged to meet Bernard and Beryl from the Black Country (where
Britain’s machine tools originally came from) for a short cruise. They will be
sailing with us across the Atlantic in November 2003. The only suitable port we
could find to meet them was Lavagna about 60 miles north of Pisa (under the left
‘armpit’ of Italy, south of Genoa). They may not have marinas, but the Italians
have a major boat building industry, producing some of the world’s most
luxurious super-yachts, and Lavagna is one of the places they are built and
repaired. We arrived off Lavagna in the middle of a terrific thunderstorm with
huge bolts of forked lightening arcing down to the sea 2 miles away from us. We
were not keen to be barbecued, and managed to use our radar to find a way
through the clouds without being fried, to arrive at Lavagna at nightfall. They
were distinctly unimpressed to see us, but finally found a berth next to a
racing super yacht that was being re-polished to a mirror like surface by some
fairly disgruntled workers who clearly felt it was quite shiny enough.
This coast north of Pisa in Tuscany is called the CinqueTerre, (which presumably
reflects the French occupation of Italy), 5 remote villages surrounded by superb
holiday and hiking country in the Apuane Alps, which can essentially only be
reached by boat or a train line that tunnels through vine clad hills that fall
almost vertically into the sea. Bernard and Beryl took the train up from Pisa
airport, (Italian trains are cheap and effective) and we explored the coast,
anchoring in delightful bays, and continuing south to Pisa which is on the mouth
of the River Arno, (having previously flowed through Florence). But the Arno is
silting up, and is surrounded by huge nets which are lowered at random
intervals, and rather seedy small rickety piers; Tony Blair and family holidayed
within 1 mile of here about a year ago. We found a mooring, but then I got
Intrepid caught on 2 shallow mooring lines. We spent an increasingly anxious 30
minutes trying to get clear, until finally the cutter which we have on our
propeller to avoid entangling nets and ropes cut us free, and we circled back to
pay for the damage. The marinero spoke no English, but was hopping mad, we were
relieved to have got ourselves free, luckily Robert a German/American
oceanographer helped translate and we arrived at a negotiated settlement of Euro
300. At least Bernard and Beryl had participated in a fairly typical boating
‘incident’, Robert drove B and B to the airport, I discovered a fellow
psychologist in the middle of this shanty pier, and normality was resumed.
We doubled back to Viareggio, a seaside resort which also builds luxury yachts
and with 6 days to wait before Pam Martin arrived for the next leg, spent a
gorgeous few days visiting Pisa, and (by train and bus) the Carrera marble mines
where the marble for all of Michaelangelo’s sculptures comes from.
I had not appreciated that Pisa’s leaning tower is actually the bell tower of
the cathedral, built in about 1100. The park (Campo dei Miricali) contains 3
buildings: the cathedral, bell tower and baptistry – all absolute gems in white
marble and stone – just grass, and 3 wonderful c 1100 buildings - collectively
breataking. I loved it. We kept coming round corners and the leaning tower pops
out at you at what really is a ridiculous angle, especially the lower 5 stories.
Apparently the builders put half the foundations on the solid rock that supports
the cathedral, but unwittingly the other half was on River Arno mud. Result: a
really massive tilt, and no doubt a blame culture among the builders which
continued until the tower was completed. A British firm stabilised the tilt
about 10 years ago, and I went up the tower, a strange feeling as you spiral up
at about a 10 degree lean.
About 20 miles north of Pisa, there is a mountain near Carrera quite literally
made of solid white marble or at least what’s left of it is. Michealangelo used
to come to Carrera to personally supervise the extraction of his favoured
marble. All the towns nearby have industries cutting, polishing and shaping
marble, and the mountain itself has huge quarries all round it and some on
surrounding mountains. The mountain itself has been half removed already
(although I suppose that it has taken about 1000 + years), and we were able to
go down a mine into the very centre of the mountain where the marble is being
extracted from the inside out. Obviously they can’t use explosives, so the
quarry work requires diamond saws, and huge splitters – the work is very
dangerous and there seemed to be large ambulance stations in each town. We could
buy pure white marble from the deep mine for Euro 300/tonne, but there wan’t
enough room in my backpack. A single family have the concession for the deep
mine, they started 20 years ago with 50 workers, now with modern equipment 8
family members working mornings only extract all they need for a ‘nice quality
of life’as they put it.
The surrounding country is a walker’s paradise, high enough to be cool, lots of
marked Grand Randonne footpaths, good public transport, isolated villages,
dramatic views. Intrepid was moored on the public quay in Viareggio, it’s a bit
like being an exhibit in a museum, there were always hordes of people walking up
and down and looking in at us, and we were a bit nervous of leaving her, but in
the event it was all fine.
When Pam arrived, we sailed south to the island of Elba, where Napolean
Bonaparte was exiled in 1813 after the fall of Paris. He was made Governor of
the island, and had a really pleasant house on a cliff top with superb views. We
went round the house which is full of prints of his battles and includes his
personal camp bed. Elba is only 10 miles from mainland Italy (there are frequent
ferries for Euro 6/person, 30 for a car); they are so frequent we had difficulty
dodging them at times. It’s a beautiful island, steep sided with a natural
harbour (Portoferraio) that Nelson particularly liked, and lots of sheltered
bays. (We liked the harbour too). The allies must have been somewhat naïve for
they allowed Napolean to keep 600 troops and a ship as Elba’s army and navy.
When he had improved everything he could think of (roads, buildings, port etc),
and was thoroughly bored, Napolean just boarded his ship with his army, evaded
the British ships, and landed in France in 1815. The rest is history.
Most of the time Elba has been very poor with the main employment prisons and
quarrying iron ore. We sailed to the east coast, which is a good example of
successful spin. It used to be called Longone and was synonymous with Alcatraz
in Italy, with the worst sort of criminal, and iron ore dust which left the
towns red. But when the mines closed a name change to Porto Azzuro worked, and
tourists now throng the main square in front of its beautiful harbour. Elba has
dozens of superb bays, we stayed as long as we could, then sailed off south east
to Rome.
The Romans did not seem to be a particularly sea faring nation, Rome is about 20
miles inland, and the Tiber is always silting up, so the only available harbour
was Fiumicina, where Tiberius had dug a canal to make the Tiber at least
partially navigable. There is only one rather shabby marina for the whole of
Rome (there may another just south…?), but we had to meet James and Jules (his
girl friend) and leave Pam, so we booked in and they were friendly enough once
we had located them. It is not easy to get into the centre of Rome from here,
and we found Rome’s transport system almost unfathomable. We took a bus, then
train then metro then walked and finally found the Colliseum and the Forum and
triumphal arches celebrating the sacking of Jerusalem in AD81 after the Jews got
tired of waiting for the 2nd coming. Rome seems to exist in a series of time
warps, its strange to be looking at the huge almost intact (albeit restored)
Colisseum looking like a present day football stadium, where thousands of
Christians were thrown to lions, then travel through time as you walk through
the Roman Forum between the Palatine and Esquiline hills to the Piazza Venezzia
which reflects the decision in 1861of the wildly feuding italian mini-states to
combine as one nation under King Vittorio Emmanuele, (although the French still
held Rome and it wasn’t actually until 1870 that they were forced out). The only
resistance came from the Pope, who was stripped of his powers, and it was only
when Mussolini came along that he restored the Vatican as the smallest
independent state in the world.
The Vatican museums are continually updated, and the last time we had been to
Rome the Cistine chapel was closed. This time we got in to see it, a totally
uncatholic frolic of Michaelangelo’s naked bodies of the last Judgement on the
end wall, and Genesis on the ceiling. Pam was thrown out by a Papal Guard (!)
but we pleaded on her behalf, and she was allowed to continue. The cistine
chapel is where the cardinals meet to elect the new pope, but most of the time
is deconsecrated (which is why its OK to charge a modest Euro 10 to see it and
the rest of the museums). The rest of the museums seemed to be largely various
gifts of artwork to the Popes, but there were some interesting maps showing
round worlds and Papal possessions even before Columbus set off.
By contrast St Peter’s Church is very holy, bare shoulders are not allowed,
although Bermuda shorts are now OK (so Pam was allowed in). The church is so big
(it holds 60,000) that its difficult to appreciate the scale of it.
Michealangelo’s dome has large clear windows which lighten it a bit, and his
Pieta sculpture (Mary holding Jesus after he came down from the cross) is
staggeringly beautiful, Michaelangelo completed it when he was 25.
Whereas Rome was the seat of the Emperors, nobles and Popes, Ostia at the mouth
of the Tiber was Rome’s port although only built some 500 years after Rome was
founded. It prospered from about 100 BC to 300AD when the river cut a new
channel during a huge storm, and an outbreak of Malaria caused the port to be
abandoned quickly. The result is Ostia Antica with some of the most intact Roman
buildings still standing anywhere, certainly some of the most representative of
every day life. They include some terrific mosaics, paintings still vivid red
after 2000 years, huge intact temples and 3 storey high condominiums which are
almost as they were in AD200 when about 12 families shared the building which
includes a luxurious bath suite on the ground floor. The entire site is about 2
kilometres by 1 kilometre, all of it stuffed with Roman houses and temples,
built of Tuffa volcanic stone arranged in diagonal patterns, and fired or
unfired clay bricks.
We reluctantly said good bye to Pam and Jules, and sailed off to Anzio south of
Rome and one of the allied landing places in WW2. They must have got the idea
from Nero who built an ancient harbour here. Now it’s a delightful fishing and
touristy port. The harbour is shallow and muddled and our pilot book suggested
anchoring, but a coast guard politely suggested we move outside; we did so, just
before a large hydrofoil ferry went right over where we had been anchored.
We continued south to Circeo which is a Gibraltar look alike with the ruins of
the old city of Circeo. According to legend Odysseus’s men were turned into wild
animals by Circe, before Odysseus charmed (or bluffed) his way into her bed and
his men were turned back into people. Now it’s a well protected port, and
everyone seems to own a small boat. It was weekend, and if Monacco was like a
marine motorway, this was like Sainsbury’s carpark on a Saturday, the entire sea
seemed to have small motorboats on it, trying to find places to moor, and
upsetting each other with their wash. We swam, then spent a rolly night, and
headed off 100 miles south east to Naples.
Naples was capital of the combined kingdom of southern Italy and Sicily for a
long time, is dominated by the Mafia, and is much closer to a southern or
eastern city than a modern European one. All our guide books were heavy with
warnings on crime, bag snatching from Vespas, squalor, dirt etc. The pilot book
warned that you couldn’t be sure that your boat would still be there when you
returned after a day out, and the few marinas are full and if there is any space
charge about Euro100/night for no facilities (by contrast central Miami charges
$40). Apparently the Mafia control the marinas (they are usually a cash business
which is popular with the M).
Sometimes we manage to get in a right mess, but just sometimes we get lucky and
round Naples we were fortunate. Naples is in the middle of, yes, the Bay of
Naples, facing west, with 2 big islands, one on each side of the bay on the end
of each promontory. The southern most one is the famously beautiful island of
Capri, the northern one Ischia. We happened to find the tiny island of Procida
which is closer to Naples than its near neighbour Ischia, but which seems to
have missed all the fuss. Procida is only 3 miles by perhaps 1 at most, but has
a large harbour with a free harbour wall right in the centre of the main square
which is lively and jolly. We parked next to another Oceanlord owned by another
Nicky and Andy (really), who are also doing the ARC this year (on another boat –
shame), swopped information, ate Pizzas and found some delightful bays to
snorkel in. We caught the hydrofoil into Naples (30 minutes, Euro 8 each way),
and with some misgivings set out to explore. Apparently the banks in Italy pay
Euro 150 for returned credit cards, so thieves steal them, use them, then return
them when they get too hot. We left all our cards behind, chained poor Intrepid
to the Procida quay, and set out to explore.
It was great, provided you liked a bit of life as it must have been lived for
centuries. The traffic ignores traffic lights and pedestrian crossings, so we
had to just step into the traffic, fix our gaze on cars approaching, and
negotiate our way across. The streets are mostly so narrow they can only take a
car in one direction, the shops are full of Italian fashion at half price, or
Nativity scenes with finely detailed figures often with working limbs. We
wandered, ate Pizza (Pizza was invented in Naples from Pitta bread, hence the
thicker pizzas in Naples compared to the thin pizzas in Rome - Naples seems to
spend more time ensuring that no rolling pins are used in making Pizzas than on
any traffic schemes), bought shirts for James, and stumbled across a tour of the
ancient aqueducts and Roman theatres 40 metres below ground. Naples is only 10
kilometres north of Vesuvius, and was started by the Greeks in about 1000BC
because they could get huge quantities of Tuffa rock (soft flexible easily cut
stone that provided ideal building blocks, superb for dealing with the c200
earthquakes that hit Naples each year). The Romans continued the idea of
building with Tuffa, but then used the mine shafts for aqueducts, so that the
inhabitants could just lower pots into the cisterns filled by the aqueducts 40
metres below to get water. The aqueducts were closed in 1850 after a huge
cholera outbreak, but we were now able to walk through the aqueducts by candle
light, some only 50cms wide to see this underground life. They were used as air
raid shelters in WW2. There is an almost intact 6000 seat Roman theatre, but the
archeologists can’t get to most of it because there are still about 20 houses
built right in the middle of the theatre. Nero perfomed plays there, and thought
Naples more Greek than Roman. We returned by hydrofoil to find Intrepid intact.
Next port is Torre del Greco just south of Naples which is so close to Vesuvius
that the next Pompeii could include Intrepid if Vesuvius cares to erupt. The
town was totally destroyed in 1700 or so, but they just shrugged and rebuilt it…
Next stop is Stromboli, Sicily Sardinia and Spain…….
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