Day Seven: Amalfi and Ferry to Catania

       In planning our three Italian destinations it didn't occur to me that getting from Praiano to Sicily could be difficult. After considering train, plane, and rental car, I decided on the all-night ferry from Salerno on the Amalfi Coast to Catania in Sicily.  (I say I because I am the travel agent in this family.) On Friday morning Ivan drove us to the bus stop from where we traveled back over the perilous road to Amalfi where we would spend the day while waiting for a ferry to Salerno. 

view from the bus

       Amalfi is a crowded tourist town with plenty of eating establishments. During our time there we finally found a good gelataria where we were able to sample some typical Italian ice cream flavors like tirimasu and pistacchio - and of course I had to try the dark chocolate. (You always get at least two flavors in your cone or cup!) We also took a tour of the Cathedral of Saint Andrew which included a museum and a courtyard garden. 

We ate our gelato on the church steps.

This statue in the piazza seemed an odd combination
of religious and obscene symbols.
But perhaps the woman is blessing passersby
with the holy water of her body.

       After spending a few hours at the piazza we found a beach where we waded in the icy water, and then had dinner at an outdoor restaurant. I had a salad to make up for all the pasta and pizza I'd been eating, and Mark discovered that an Italian hamburger may not be a good choice. 

       We had tickets for the 7:00 ferry to Salerno but we went out to wait on the pier at 6:30 to make sure we got good seats. Mark took this photo from the pier:

       There was a large group of children, apparently on a field trip to Salerno, who were waiting on the steps behind us. When they saw the ferry coming in to port they streamed toward it, pushing us out of the way to get ahead in line. I was quite annoyed by their rudeness, so I pushed my way through them, saying, "scusi, scusi" as I went with Mark behind me. Some of the girls got mad and tried to block our way. Mark looked up the translation for "We were there first and you pushed ahead." He showed them the Italian translation on his phone and they stopped complaining. Later on the ferry Mark made some friendly remarks to some of the kids to try to make amends. 

Some of the children on their field trip.

       As we approached the port in Salerno Mark saw the Grimaldi Lines ferry that we would take to Sicily which was docking several miles from the Travelmar dock. When booking our tickets I had foolishly assumed both ferries would be at the same dock. The Travelmar ferry arrived in Salerno at 8:00. We were supposed to board the Grimaldi ferry at 9:00 for our 10:00 departure. It looked like we'd have plenty of time to make it by foot, and we started walking toward the other dock through a pretty park. But the park ended at a dead end and we had to walk away from the water and our view of the ferry in order to go around a large industrial area. We walked faster and faster as our destination seemed to get further away and we started to wonder if we would miss our boat. Nearly running with our backpacks, we were both sweating profusely. We finally arrived at a ticket booth where we had to show our passports and were then seated on a shuttle that would take us to the ferry. 

     Grimaldi ferries are mainly freight carriers that also have a section of cabins and a restaurant for passengers. We watched dozens of huge trucks drive onto the ferry while we stood outside on the deck. 

 

Made it! Safely on the way to Sicily.

       We were pleasantly surprised by the nice, clean cabin we were provided for our overnight journey. There were two bunk beds in the room, so we each slept on a bottom bunk. We spent as much time as possible on deck, looking at the view, but there was a strong smell of diesel outside. Also, a lot of the other passengers went outside to smoke . . . .  Which brings me to an observation I want to comment on, that there seem to be a lot more smokers in Italy than there are in the States. Smoking is prohibited inside public buildings, but whenever we ate outside, which we did much of the time, people would be smoking nearby. Ash trays sat on the tables - something I haven't seen in a long time here in the States. And cigarette butts littered the cobblestones in many of the otherwise scenic spots. So this was one of the less pleasant surprises of our trip.