Tropea-Vibo Marina-Stromboli

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Tropea

Our next stop in Italy after the interesting harbor of Reggio, was Tropea. The marina was really nice and had water, electricity, and SHOWERS!!! It was lovely not to have to shower with a hose on the back of the boat!! Lovely, the small things in life 😊

Exploring Tropea was interesting because the city is situated on cliffs above the marina. We had to walk up around 200 steps to actually get to the city. The town is worth the climb. It is a cute place, with narrow streets, a lot of little shops, restaurants, and a wonderful view of the ocean. We made several trips, the best is at night, or right around sunset.

We had an interesting experience the last night there, when we walked up into town to go to the internet cafe. We walked in and were about to sit down at the computer, when a girl motioned that we needed to pay first at the counter. We walked over there, completely willing to do so, and the older man behind the counter asked us where we were from. After we said the US, he said we needed our passports if we wanted to use the internet. Our minds went blank. We don't carry our passports with us, and this was the first time anyone said we needed them for internet. We asked why, out of pure curiosity, and he said something like, "Your President says that we are all terrorists, so now our President say you are all terrorists." Then he pointed to several signs saying similar things about terrorists. So needless to say we didn't get to use the internet that night, and we decided even if we weren't leaving the next day we wouldn't use it anyway. A strange experience!!

Vibo Marina

After four days in Tropea we sailed north 12 miles up the coast to a small town called Vibo Marina. They had space for the boat for three weeks and Lois and Gunter jumped at the opportunity because finding any space in the Med has been difficult. The owner of the marina is a Angela, a Canadian woman who has lived in Italy for the last 29 years after she married an Italian.
We met he nephew, Fabio, who spoke really good English and he invited us out on Sunday for the most delicious ice cream I have ever had, and drinks down by the ocean. It was really fun, we even asked him about the mafia which started an interesting conversation.
We spent most of our time in Vibo cleaning the boat because there was a potential buyer coming to look at it. So we scrubbed fenders, polished, washed, dusted, cleaned, sanded, etc...

As a reward for everyones hard work we went on a night excursion to the island of Stromboli, which has an active volcano. IT was wonderful to be on a boat and not have to worry about mooring lines or fenders or anything really. We could just sit and relax.
The island was beautiful and when it got dark we even got to see the volcano in action.

We have had so much fun on the boat, but now are really excited to start our land travel!!!!

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