The Enemies of Fun

These little demons may stand in the way of your expectations of a fabulous island getaway, a mud bath, and a little torture.
By torture, I am referring to Ischia’s Museum of Torture, located in the Castello Aragonese, which is reason number one that I decided to visit the island. Reasons two and three were the purported beauty of the destination and the abundance of mineral springs and mud baths available to all who desire to make use of them.
However, I had not counted on a cast of characters and circumstances conspiring to make my relaxing visit more on par with stabbing white-hot pokers into my eyeballs while being serenaded by the sound of children throwing temper tantrums. I urge you to keep an eye out for these pesky villains throughout your own adventures.

The Charming Swindler—He Will Make You Miss The Boat

I made one last stop in Naples, determined to catch the one tourist-y thing I had yet to do—the Duomo (chapel). I’m grateful I did, because it was the single most stunning piece of architecture I have seen in my life to date. I did not, however, plan on being accosted by a very charming, very handsome, slightly older Italian gentleman who offered to give me a tour. I had sort of planned to pop in and pop out, since I was on a tight deadline to catch the hydrofoil to Ischia. But of course, with so generous an offer from such a cute guy, I said yes, and proceeded to be led around by this very knowledgeable and VERY patriotic Neapolitan. I got way more out of being guided by him than I would have otherwise. And then, after about 50 minutes more than I had planned on staying, he held out his hand. I smiled, batted my eyelashes, and shook it, thanking him profusely in Italian. Then slowly I realized, when he didn’t go away, that he wasn’t looking for signs of affection, or my phone number. He simply wanted the money that I was so jealously guarding during my days in the expensive big cities. And I was a sucker.

The Union—It Will Leave You Stranded

When I arrived on Ischia, two hours later than planned, I was rarin’ to go. However, the nice man at the tourist office informed me that my hotel was really, really, really far away from the main harbor, and that the only way to reach it without paying through the nose was to take a bus. And the bus drivers were on strike. For the next four hours. And since the idea of wandering the island with my entire worldly possessions on my back did not appeal to me, I settled for having a cappuccino and planning the rest of my day, thinking that the first bus out would be at 2:15.
But the 2:15 bus evidently leaves at 2 every third Tuesday in all months ending in “y.” And waiting for the 2:30 bus seems like a good idea, except for when it is, in actuality, a 3 o’clock bus, as was the case today.

Hidden Hotels—And Cheshire Cat City Planners

Elsewhere in Italy, each bus depot lists all the stops the bus makes, so that you can determine exactly where you need to get off. In Ischia, however, they only list final destinations. So when I saw two signs for my hotel in the span of a minute, I figured I must be very near. I was wrong. From where I got off, I still had to walk 1.5 km to reach my destination. Up the world’s steepest incline. With 40 lbs of crap on my back. And in my arms. And around my waist. As I got closer to the hotel, the directional signs disappeared. There were no maps, no further signs with my hotel's name on them, and nothing was open so that I might ask someone, seeing as it was siesta at the moment. The street my hotel was located on appeared to be a tiny alley, hidden from mainstream society in a back corner that any logical person would completely overlook. Which is ironic considering that I booked the hotel through Expedia.com. Baffled by this directional inconsistency, I half expected to encounter a sign that said Hotel Internazionale, under which lay two arrows pointing in opposite directions. This seemed perfectly reasonable, considering that though the address was #33, it came after numbers 7, 9, 13, 45, 30 and 37, in that order. I determined that if I did everything that was counterintuitive, I would survive this island.

The Misguided Concierge—He’s Far Too Busy Playing With His Beribboned Poodle To Be Bothered With Your Needs

At dinnertime, I asked for a non-touristy restaurant where I could get pasta, and was told by the man at reception that I should head to the docks and eat at a place called Mezzanotte, or midnight. I should mention that the docks are just about the only place where the tourists are certain to be, and that the restaurant, which was closed on this particular night, every week of the year, only served pizza. I should also mention that he told me that the last bus back to my obscure part of the island left the station at 12 am.

I waited for the bus to the docks in the town square for at least a few centuries. In the rain. With an Italian girl who was simply furious, and kept barking angry questions at me in Italian. Each time she did this, I repeated, “I don’t speak Italian,” but she continued to hurl her contempt at life and the aggravating bus situation in my general direction. I was relieved when we finally got on the bus, and the driver became the target of her very focused tantrum, which lasted the full thirty minutes back to the marina. When they parted ways with a flirty, “ciao,” and a kiss, I realized that this is just how Neapolitans sound when they are conversing, so perhaps the young lady had not confused me with the person responsible for causing all the buses to be an hour and a half behind schedule.

The Dead Battery—Only Happens When You Need It Most

I found a lovely restaurant that was practically empty, overlooking the bay, and absolutely devoured a pizza and a half bottle of wine, reasoning that the nearly unbearable trek up the side of a mountain justified eating every last bite. I headed back to the station at around 11:20. At which point, I made the discovery that the last bus to my part of the island left at 11:05, as it does every night of the year, and not at midnight. Also, evidently, it is the only bus all day in all of Ischia, which leaves promptly when it is scheduled to leave. In my annoyance, I decided to call the proprietor of my hotel and demand that he come pick me up. But the cell phone I am borrowing from Sue and Ross was dead.

Fortunately, another driver on a different route took pity on me and let me off at a stop not officially on his route. He looked apologetic as he explained that I still had a ten or fifteen minute walk, and it was up a rather steep hill. I looked out the door of the bus, looked back at the driver, and grinned. I recognized it. By now I was a pro. It would have been nice to have had a mud bath when I got back, but I think I fell asleep with my shoes still on.

I figured I might still catch the Museum of Torture (which I now believed to be quite apropos of the island) early the next morning before embarking for Capri. After a terse scolding to the concierge about the bus schedule and a refusal of the coffee I so desperately wanted, out of fear I might miss the bus, I had the pleasure of waiting two hours for it to arrive. This was because the buses were labeled differently than it stated on the sign, and differently than they had been the night before, so I let two go by without realizing that the CS bus also traveled the F bus route (because it’s perfectly obvious, isn’t it). I reached the marina just in time to catch the one and only boat to Capri, and to bid Ischia goodbye, and good riddance.

But perhaps only by journeying through hell, are we truly able to appreciate heaven. And if Capri isn’t heaven, then I refuse to die.