Tuesday 28 August 2007. The Island Star arrives at Geoa, Italy. It sails past the industrial area of the port and right into the city waterfront where there are moorings for cruise ships and ferries.
It is an old city, spoiled a little by an elevated roadway running right across the waterfront. Some of the buildings look a little tired and run down.
A huge quayside building, the Stazione Marittima leads from the wharf to a pleasantly spectacular piazza, the front of the building telling of past glories. It was well maintained and truly impressive. Excursions were being offered to Milan and Portofino amongst other places. We had opted for doing our own thing today and hopped innocently onto a free city shuttle bus. This took us on a very roundabout journey, passing through a couple of tunnels before dropping us off in the middle of the city. I had no idea at all in which direction the port was or how far away it was!
Well, we have a good choice of directions to go in, so we just set off. You never know - we might find our way back to the ship... This cafe looked familiar. Our favourite Blackpool cafe (we live there) has this same Elvis figure sitting in its window! I saw a sign for a Tourist Information office and we were able to get a street map and sort out where we were.
We were on a hill. Going up led to the medieval part of the city and going down led back towards the waterfront and through a maze of alleyways. We headed uphill, coming to this magnificent gateway through the old city wall. Then a few steps down and we came to a small piazza to our right, almost every inch of which was covered with parked scooters, Lambrettas, Vespas - the Italians like their scooters. I don't think there was a single motorbike amongst them!
On our left side was this wonderful ruin about which I know nothing whatsoever. I could go off searching on Google, but then I know that a few of my readers like these little challenges, so if you know what this is called, how old it is, who built it, whether it was used for worship, games or sacrificing grasshoppers - please leave a comment or get in touch!
And now we have a look at the small building next door... This was labelled quite clearly and proudly as Christopher Colombus's house. He was born here in fact, although when we called he had gone out... I don't know what it is with us and Italy, we are just unlucky in this way. We went to see Vesuvius one year and that had gone out too...
We left the birthplace of Christopher Colombus and passed once more through the medieval gate, heading eventually into the dark and slightly seedy alleyways leading to the waterfront.
Some of them are well lit and filled with shops and neon light. Some are alleys in the truer sense of the word, dark with six-storey buildings on either side, concealed doorways and smoking men looking at you suspiciously. A chap walking alone in front of us was accosted by a prostitute. He waved her away irritably. She didn't take offence.
I even found a guitar shop in one of the alleys, though I thought perhaps I might have problems getting it on the flight home. We were looking for a tobacconist as Fran had some cards to post. I haven't a clue what stamps is in Italian and when we eventually found a tobbaconist we went in warily and I said a tentative "poste?" The tobacconist tutted (in Italian) and said in perfect English: "Post office - next door!" Ah...! Well, for Heaven's sake - it's yellow! Red! That's the colour post offices should be! We have some more wandering to do before we return to the ship, but once we were back we got into a conversation with a couple who said "We were walking through some alleys and ran into some Carabinerie police. They said it was too dangerous for tourists to be in the alleys and they escorted us back to the waterfront!"
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