The Ferry Ride from Hell

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Hi Everyone. I know I still owe you a proper entry about Italy, and intend to do so as soon as I have a few minutes. However, I feel much more of a need to tell you about our lovely little day of travelling yesterday. Also, just a little sidenote, these brilliant Croatians thought it would be a funny gamem to play on the unsuspecting tourists to switch the "z" and the "y" on the keyboard. I will try my best to adjust, but please excuse the mistakes. Also, I cant seem to find the apostrohe on this thing, so you will have to do without that as well.

We left Positano yesterday morning on a wonderful ferry that took us along the amulfi coast and landed us in Solerno which is just north of Sicily. From there, we caught a 2 hour train to another small town (of course I cant rember the name...must remember to use my journal!). From there we took a 3 hour Eurostar train to Bari where we would catch our ferry to Croatia.

When we arrived in rainy Bari to buy our ferry tickets, we were weighing between actually getting a cabin for the 9-hour overnight right to Dubrovnik or to just tough it out on deck and hope we can find a bench or something to sleep on. Seeing as the cabins were extremely expensive and I am still trying to prove to Dave (and myself) that I am the tough backing girl I strive to be, we decided to go for the deck passes. Since we had arrived in Bari so eary, we figured we could just make sure we were the first ones to board the boat and seek out a worth area for sleeping. To make things even better, we met a group of young British backpackers at the port. They had decided to get a cabin, so they kindly offered up their sleeping bags to us. Perfect!

The plan was going perefectly according to plan. Dave had found a common room on the boat where there were booths with soft, couch-like, benches and tables. Again, perfect! Dave and I boarded the boat at about 8:30 and the boat was not scheduled to disembark until 10pm, so we figured we had a good amount of time to have a drink, relax and settle in, before we curled up with our newly aquired sleeping bags for a restful 8 hours of sleep (at least)!

About an hour went by and our peacful sleeping cove slowly but surely became the amusement park for every large, loud, and obnoxious family on the boat. I mean, canćt these people get rooms Gods sake?! There was one family imparticular (or at least they all seemed to be one family) of about 20 people. They ranged from small children, to loud, drunk husbands, to loud, drunk wives, to grandmothers, to the yappy family dog that attacked every person that walked by. At this point in the early evening, it was all actually quite amusing.

However, then the boat began to move. Within 15 minutes we knew this was going to be a rough ride. Drinks were spilling and people were falling over with their chairs as the wind and rain continued to pick up. Then the sea sickness set in. Dont worry, I was fine. It was everyone else in that room (and all over the boat) that one by one began to lose their stomachs....everywhere. Some into garbage cans, some into seasickness bags, but most, unfortunately, just went ahead right onto the floor. I had never seen anything like it. It was at about this point that Dave, too, started to look rather green. He decided to go downstairs to see if he could grab us that cabin afterall. He came back stark white, sweating, and exhausted looking (obviously having gotten sick) and informed me that we had a room. I was also informed by the woman showing us to our little bunk bedded cabin that it is NEVER this rough. Thanks lady, that makes me feel much better!

I am not going to go into the details of the next hour or so, but it wasnćt pleasant. However, we had our little room with our own bathroom which did help. I will tell you now that I somehow managed to not get sick, but I was scared shitless for a sleepless 7 hours of the roughest boat ride I have ever been on in my life. Our little room had a window and I could see the waves slamming up over the deck and feel the wind whipping against the side of the boat. There is no way to explain it except for being truly awful (to the point of hilarity, I guess).

As you now know, we have arrived safely in Dubrovnik which seems to be absolutely beautiful (even from just our short walk down to Old Town to get breakfast). We are going to head back to our little guestroom now and try to sleep of this feeling that we are still on the boat. The computer screen is literally swaying in front of me.

It was quite an experience to say the least.

Okay, off for a nap and then some exploring. I will write again when I can.

Miss you all!

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Comments

[cunch]

literally...
i could not think of a more horrible situation. me and my fear of the losing of the stomach..you two are BRAVE!