Citizenship can’t mar cruise

Karen and Bruce Clark

Our 39-foot motor yacht lay in the warm September Italian sun in the

port of Portoferraio on the island of Elba, best known as the site of

Napoleon’s exile. Passersby stop and look at her name and port of

registry. “Avanti” from “Corona del Mar” they read, thinking her home

must be some port in Spain. We had purposely left off the

“California” label in hopes that any random terrorists wouldn’t

realize we were Americans and that Europeans angry at our president’s

policies wouldn’t yell at us. Of course, it turned out that our fears

were misplaced.

No terrorists lurked on the docks, and we were treated with great

friendliness wherever we went. The anger most Europeans feel toward

our president did not extend to us.

Visiting Elba was a part of our grand Mediterranean adventure. We

bought our boat in Mallorca, off the coast of Spain, and planned to

cruise “the Med” for a year or two or five, or until we ran out of

good places to visit. Accompanying us on the trip was our faithful

mutt, Roka, a veteran of the humane society shelter and an intrepid

traveler. We would return home to sunny Corona del Mar during the

winter months when Europe turns cold and rainy.

Our efforts at traveling incognito worked well, except for one

sailor in Barcelona, who looked at the name on our transom and asked

with disbelief, “Corona del Mar, California?”

As it turned out, he was a Newport Harbor High graduate and had

lived on his boat in the harbor in Barcelona for the past 10 years.

We cruised from Mallorca along the coasts of Spain and the French

Cote d’Azur, past the Italian Riviera and the coast of Tuscany. We

struggled with our weak Spanish in Spain, proceeded to butcher the

French language for a couple months and finally were grappling with a

language we knew even less well, Italian.

This far off the tourist track, English is just not spoken much.

But it turns out that minimal language skills and abundant arm-waving

work just fine.

Portoferraio is the main harbor for the small Italian island of

Elba, just off the Tuscan coast. When Napoleon was exiled here in

1814, he could not have asked for a more charming home.

The bay at Portoferraio is huge, but a small harbor tucked below a

steep hill became the heart of the town centuries ago. Today those

centuries-old buildings climbing the hill still house a boisterous

population of Elbans. A 16th century castle crowns the top of the

hill. As in many Mediterranean ports, the waterfront at Portoferraio

is extremely noisy, and Avanti’s stern backed right onto the main

street.

There was a constant stream of pedestrians and motor scooters

bringing patrons to the bars and pizza trattorias across the street.

The result was a continuous ruckus well into the night. We decided

they were drawn by the delicious ice cream available all through

town.

In our experience, the local Internet cafe served the very best

gelato in all of Italy.

It’s surprisingly easy to reach Elba. Dozens of ferries connect it

with the mainland in less than an hour, and they run day and night.

The ships are big and modern, and many sport giant cartoon

pictures of Moby Dick, Taz, Daffy Duck and the Road Runner on their

hulls. It’s yet another example of American culture’s affect on the

world.

In many ways, Elba was a big surprise to us. After visiting

Tuscany, the island gave us an entirely different view of Italian

life. A circumnavigation of the island on small, winding roads takes

only about six hours, but it is best to allow a couple of days to

enjoy the island’s ambience.

The countryside is mountainous and green, with terraced vineyards,

a dramatic rocky shoreline and beautiful, sandy beaches.

The steep mountains prevent any large-scale farming, so small

vineyards dot the landscape. Mining was the historical base for the

economy, carried on from Etruscan times until well into the 20th

century. Evidence of the old iron mines can still be seen in the

eastern part of the island. Today, tourism is the main source of

income. Most tourists are Italians, French and Brits, searching for

the ideal beach during the summer months. There are few Americans. We

were fortunate to be there in a relatively quiet time, September. It

was already a bit cool for the beach, so the big crowds had headed

home. We met only three other American boats in Elba, and one of

those was owned by an Italian couple living in Pennsylvania and

another by a French couple from New York.

Getting around on Elba is also easy. There are a half-dozen car

and motor scooter rental agencies at the ferry dock, available for

around $40 per day. We trekked the island by boat, foot, car, bike

and motor scooter. We carry two bikes on board Avanti so we can bike

around the towns and nearby countryside. Roka rides in her own

plastic box mounted on the back of one of the bikes. The roads are

mostly small with no shoulder, so they can be a bit scary on a bike.

The locals may be laid-back islanders, but they’re still crazy

Italian drivers. But traffic is generally light, so biking can be a

good way to travel. We also ventured out on a rented Vespa one day

(available at the local “Baby Rents” shop) to see the more

mountainous parts of the island.

The small hilltop towns on the north side of Elba are alone worth

the visit to the island. Situated high above the wind-blown sea and

green vineyards, they look out over the entire island to the

mainland. In the tiny hill town of Poggio we discovered Da Publius,

our favorite restaurant in all of Italy. The food was so good that we

felt obligated (to our stomachs) to rent a car for a second day for

the sole purpose of eating there again. Poggio can be seen in about

15 minutes or less. In addition to the restaurant, it has one

interesting church, a few houses, a hotel and a tiny grocery store.

Although the restaurant is the highest-rated on the island, it was

almost empty on both our visits. On our second visit, the young

couple who run the restaurant remembered us, and even seated us at

“our” table. Our favorite dish was their wild boar, cinghale -- a

specialty in Elba -- and a fabulous dessert called formelladi gelato

alle merenge, a delectable, anti-Atkins dessert of ice cream,

meringue and dark chocolate.

From our table, we looked out over the sea to mainland Italy. We

also watched an elderly woman washing pink napkins by hand in a basin

in the downstairs yard, while a small child played nearby. Noting

that our napkins were pink, we correctly surmised that the

grandmother of the family was washing the restaurant’s daily supply

of fine pink napkins while she baby-sat her small grandson.

Poggio also lies at the foot of Mt. Caponne, the highest mountain

on Elba, where the fearless can take a rickety, stand-up “gondola” to

the mountaintop. There, a dramatic view unfolds to mainland Italy to

the east and the French island of Corsica to the west. The “gondola”

is no more than a small wooden platform enclosed by a wire cage and

suspended from a rusty cable. But it is the quick and popular way up

the mountain.

We had always believed that Napoleon’s “exile” in Elba was

confined and miserable, but it turns out that he had a fabulous life

there, at least by any normal person’s standards. He was made the

emperor of Elba and given a staff and army of 1,000. He was provided

with two big houses, one in Portoferraio and a country home about 20

miles outside of town. Both can still be visited. The main house sits

high on the hill above the port with views of the port from the front

and mainland Italy from the rear. During his nine-month rule on the

island, he reformed the government, set up a modern school system and

built roads and irrigation systems that are still in use.

Personally, we would have been content to be Napoleon in Elba and

would have quickly forgotten about the glories of France. But

Napoleon had been the emperor of France and had lived in the Palace

at Versailles. He had bigger visions for himself than ruling 100,000

Elbans. So he soon set sail for France with his small army that

marched with little opposition back to Paris and forced the king to

flee. He was again the emperor of France. But the exasperated leaders

in the rest of Europe refused to tolerate his return and sent their

armies against him. He was defeated at Waterloo less than six months

after his return. He was then exiled to a small island out in the

Atlantic, where his exile truly was miserable, unlike Elba, and he

soon died.

After a month in Italian waters, we left Portoferraio for Corsica,

now a part of France. At least our French is better than our Italian.

And we looked forward to getting back to those wonderful, buttery

French croissants!

* KAREN AND BRUCE CLARK are residents of Corona del Mar.