Location: Elba, Italy
Argo is off to Portoferraio, Elba, early this morning for a much-needed repair to the cutlass barring. We readied the ship and our stomachs for the day, eating homemade frittata with mushrooms, peppers, and spinach. Greta, Del, and Calli started their day off with morning yoga, basking in the early sun rays. Chelsea and I helped lift the anchor as we headed to the port. We had to pack our day packs and overnight bags for surprise! A CAMPING TRIP!!!! This is seamesters first camping trip as we waited for Argo to be right and ready. Mac drove us in the dinghies to land, where it occurred to us that we hadnt set foot on land in 2 days. Once everyone was together, we immediately started our day hike!!
Passing vineyards, incredible ocean views, and a very cute cat with a mustache. This hike was beyond perfect, especially due to Rob or DJ Music Man, who curated house music and remixes for our excursion. We hiked to the top of Monte dEnfola, a tiny peninsula in Elba. We found a tunnel that led to the rest of the hike, where we held a CAVE RAVE with Robs music. Caroline and Hillary especially jammed out. We climbed down this steep face to get to an overlook via rope handrails. The overlook was beautiful, definitely best seen from the top of the rocks that Skylar, Daisy, and I climbed on top of.
Stick pulled out the drone, which was definitely a nice touch. About two miles back from the overlook, we ate lunch at Emanuel, a cute pizza and coffee shop near the beach. Miles, Gordon, and I had Caf Fro or iced coffee. We gorged ourselves on pizza. On the way back, Chelsea, Liam, and I played the Umbrella game (if you know, you know), and Liam definitely was stressed, haha! At the end of the hike with blistered feet, we calculated that the hike was a total of 11.5 miles! The whole group met Sean back in Portoferrario, where he spent the day with a jelly donut, multiple coffees, and a miniature hike to the place where Napoleon was held in prison!
We all got gelato, and I really recommend pistachio. Then, we shopped and got snacks at the COOP grocery store, where everyone was stocked and ready for our camping trip. Joe got to see the boat lifted out of the water for repairs, and this is a very rare experience because, mostly, you never see Argo from that angle. A bus met us to take us to Lacona on the other side of the island, where we were met with 20-something hammocks set up by Amanda all by herself WHAT. There were double-decker hammocks. Caroline and I had our own double-decker, where she pulled an awesome maneuver to get up to the top hammock. We then raced to the beach on the Gulf dLacona, where there were no waves. The water was so salty that we would float. After the warmest showers in all of history, emphasis on the s. The best dinner yet happened as we dried off under the umbrella trees. A COOKOUT! Let me tell you that after an 11.5-hour hike, burgers and Italian beer are heavenly. Rob was especially excited about the beer and the beer lights, where we strapped our headlamps to the bottles to make a yellowish light from the liquid. We stayed up talking for hours, careful not to anger the Italian and German people at the campsites around us. Sleeping under the stars was one of the best experiences so far, filled with yummy burgers thanks to Anna and sore, blistered feetall for now from Argo.