When we got off the ferry Brenda and I immediately buy tickets for one of Capri's main attractions, the Blue Grotto (Grotto Azzurra). The Grotto is a sea cave that is illuminated by a light that passes underwater and creates a neon blue reflection in the water...it basically looks like the cave is lighting up. Brenda and I have been talking about doing this since we started planning the trip, so this was a must-see for us. We talk to the guy at the ticket counter and ask him what the best option for the trip is...to sail out to the Grotto then immediately return ($12) or sail all the way around the island and see the blue grotto and a bunch of other grottos ($15). We ask the guy if the ride is rough trip and Brenda goes, will I "BLAAH" and gives the guy a vomit face. He starts laughing and goes, you'll just feed the birds! So we decide to do the $15 tour and sail around the entire island. We jump on our boat with about 34 other people, the boat driver and a little round Italian guy in a dingy in tow and we sail away. We get to the grotto pretty quickly and are sitting in our boat and watching all these guides and private tours fight for position on the water to unload passengers into smaller boats then into the grotto. We sit there for about a half hour watching this go down...all the guys who were working for the same company (the company we were on) are setting their boats up to box out the outnumbered boats and keep them and their passengers on the other side and out of the mix. All the boat drivers are yelling at each other and shouting back and forth and you can't really tell if they're mad or just talking that way normally, but once we start to see the formation of the boats, we realize what's going on.
While we're waiting for our turn, we start chatting with the people next to us and decide to go on the same small boat together if we can. So our turn is up and one-by-one we jump on the smaller boat. The husband and wife go first then Brenda sits down (basically on the husband's lap) then I take the spot up at the front facing the other three. Now, we're not exactly sitting up and going out for a stroll on the water. Brenda and the other two are packed like sardines in the back of the boat and we are all laying with our backs on the floor of the boat. We've been watching everyone else do this while we've been waiting and we pretty much need to lay flat in the boat so we can get through the entrance of the cave without getting decapitated (wish i was exaggerating here). The boat driver is now rowing in and out while other boats are coming out and he's timing the swells going into the cave so he doesn't fly overboard. He gives this chain a pull for leverage into the cave and 1-2-3 wham-bam-thank-you-m'am, we are inside! It's pitch black coming in then your eyes adjust and the water inside is glowing, it was a pretty crazy sight! Taking pictures inside was pretty impossible, but I took one anyway. Once you get inside all the boat drivers sing in Italian and it echoed throughout the cave, it was pretty cool. A few people remarked that it was like a ride at Disney...very much like Pirates of the Carribean only umm real life. Here you can see the video I took of us heading into the cave:
This is the inside of the cave...really fuzzy, but the blue color is really that bright!
After the Blue Grotto we took the boat around the entire island which got kind of long and our stomachs weren't feeling too well (not sure how these Coast Guard guys do it!). I turned to Brenda at one point and was like, Ok, I'm over this, take my back to dry dock; I'm through! Unfortunately another guy on the boat couldn't hold it and started puking over the side of the boat (this instantly made us feel better since we knew it wasnt just us). Needless to say, if you ever come here, just do the $12 tour unless you want a 2 hour boat ride. So we finally got back to dock and headed further up the island to Anacapri by railcare, then by bus where my life flashed before my eyes 35 times in a 5 minute drive. We got to the top and then took a chairlift ALL the way to the top where you can overlook all of Capri. That was pretty cool and I got quite a few photos. There was a restaurant at the top so we stopped for a while and sat out in the sun and had a regional beer called Nastro Azzurro. This is where Brenda says to me...hey, the guy at the ticket booth said we were going to feed the fishes on the boat today...we didn't feed any fish! To which I replied, Bren, we didn't feed any fish because we didn't puke!
After a while we called it a day and took the chairlift down the mountain to the bus that takes you to a railcare that brings you to the ferry and docks you at land to pick up the bus to take us to CAPO to get the car to drive home. Get all that?
For dinner tonight, we forgot it was Monday and not too many places are open. We found a pizza place and got pizza and beer for dinner...I feel like I'm at home!! Tomorrow we're going downtown to all the shops and stores to walk around and have a chill day. We haven't stopped moving since I got here and we want to rest up before we head up to Rome. I also get to sleep in tomorrow...total bonus!
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