Visiting La Maddalena, October 17, 2005

Visiting La Maddalena, October 17, 2005

We’ve arrived and visited with Francine, a dear friend. She is the owner of a bar called the “Club 56.” When we lived here 20+ years ago we spent a lot of time there. It is still the same place; however there are fewer pictures on the wall and a few less people. It was great to see the Club; it still has the same bathroom it did 2 decades ago. Women perfect the “squat” and men perfect the “aim” when visiting the bagno. We enjoyed catching up with Francine and getting the scoop we missed out on for the last 20 years.

Francine’s daughter Titziana came to visit us at our hotel room. We are staying at “Il Gabbiano”, translated to “The Seagull”. We are right on the water and have a great view of the ferries and the waterfront. We have known Titziana since she was age five. We made plans to go to the beach with Titziana and her significant other Antonello and their beautiful black lab Clay. We went to a beach on the island of Capeara, which is connected to La Maddelena by an old wooded bridge. After some fun in the sun we packed it up and did a driving tour of the island. There are ruins of military strong holds all over the island. It was amazing to see all the stone structures and how much “man power” it must have taken to create these amazing relics. We did walk around an abandoned battery and saw where the guns were kept. These are nothing short of a castle in size, simply huge.

Over the next few days we plan to visit places such as, Jeanne’s old school, Vista Mare Elementary. We are going to head back to the beautiful beaches, and perhaps charter either a motor boat or sail boat to get on the water. But the weather will be the factor of all our ideas. We’ll keep you posted as to what is next!