Around the Isle of Capri

One day when Lies and I were swimming around in the mediterranean, an old guy passed by us in a little boat. I made a joke about him nearly running us over and he assured us that we were safe and puttered on along. Shortly he puttered on back and asked us if we were enjoying ourselves and if we were friends. We said we were having a delightful time and that we were sisters. He then asked us if we had seen the green grotto. We said no. He asked if we wanted to come with him for a swim in the aforementioned location. Liesl and I politely refused. He asked why not. We said we were quite happy here but thanks. He said it was a beautiful place to swim and that we would be quite safe with him. We asked him how much he wanted and he said, come on, it's free! Feeling rather vulnerable but wanting to feel alive enough to take some risk, I decided to swim over and climb aboard. Lies somewhat hesitatingly followed. At this point I should say that the guy was old, like in his 70s old, and was so wiry that I thought if push came to shove, I could take him. That is how we ended up on the boat of Antonio heading to the green grotto.

After about 10 mins of cruising, we arrived at an archway over stunningly green water. Antonio told us to jump off, swim through and he would pick us up on the other side. While the thought crossed our mind that he might abandon us there, we took another risk and swam through.

Antonio was waiting faithfully for us on the other side and when he saw us, he dived his leatherback body in to join us. He had a snorkelling mask and told us to come and see the champagne grotto. We swam over to one of the white cliff walls and he pointed to a tiny hole smaller than the size of a head. We laughed and said no way, and with that, he put on the mask, dived under, disappeared and resurfaced on the other side of the hole. He implored us to come and join him. We told him he was crazy. He kept pleading, that it was beautiful, that we would love it, that we should just come on. Finally I grew some ovaries and decided to attempt it. I failed. The wash from the waves was quite stong, I had no idea how far I had to swim and backed out after not making it immediately. He passed me the mask through the hole and asked me to try again. With the mask I could see the swim was easy and I soon surfaced inside a tiny simmering silver and shell encrusted grotto, rising and falling with the waves. I told Lies she had to see it, passed her the mask and she too swallowed her fear and came inside. As beautiful as it was, this special little secret grotto, we are ashamed to admit that both of us wondered if Antonio might not see this small enclosure as his chance to take advantage. He didn't, and we swam out and back to the boat in safety. On board his boat again he gave us a soft drink and drove us back to our original swimming hole. We thanked him enormously and departed, thinking maybe the scam was that someone had stolen our gear off the beach while we were gone. They hadn't. There was no scam. We had just been treated to a delightful experience by a lovely old Italian man. We both felt very sad and ashamed that we had questioned him the whole time and that we could have such a negative image of the world. Antonio restored our faith and the next day we wanted to try and thank him.
We realised that the boat Antonio was driving was one in a group that the hotel organised tours of the island on (for an rather large fee of course). We booked a trip for the two of us and asked if we could please have Antonio. Liesl got some very strange looks for this personal request and they said they would try to organise it. As we were waiting at the jetty, we watched a number of boats come and go with their guests, but no Antonio. Then we saw a shirtless hunk steaming towards us. We heard a guy from another boat call out to him, to Antonio, and suddenly we realised why our request might have raised a few eyebrows! Funnily enough, as much as we would have been happy cruising with this new Antonio, he was not our captain either. We got another crusty old man, who did not say a word to us, but who provided us with a lovely tour anyway. Here are some photos we took from this trip around the most beautiful isle of Capri.

First, here is our boat, our captain and those infamous fraggles in the background!
Some of the old roman ruins that litter the island
The famous, crowded, and rather surreal blue grotto
Looking back at our boat after climbing up into the white grotto.
Kicking back on board
And cruising back into the little bay where our hotel was nestled. Home sweet home.

xxx