December 10

Dear Friends and Family,

We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are enjoying the holiday season.

So much for the more regular updates. Since our last posting we’ve settled into something of a routine in our winter home port of Gaeta, Italy, a seaside town about an hour north of Napoli and an hour and a half south of Rome. Before we tell you a bit about our life here in Gaeta, we’ll back up to cover some of our adventures on the way here. We last wrote from San Rafael, France while we were awaiting the arrival of Steve’s parents and sister. They did arrive, and we decided to move on to Cannes, as we did not find San Rafael to be the charming town we had expected.

Our plan with our visitors was to do a bit of dividing up. We wanted to move quickly toward our winter destination, which would involve an overnight crossing from the south coast of France over to Corsica, a 15-20 hour trip for us. Sarah was going to take a land trip with her aunt and grandparents, while the other four of us would do the sail. For several days the weather did not cooperate, so we played around Cannes, the highlight being an afternoon and evening in St Paul de Vence, a medieval walled city high in the hills overlooking the Riviera. In addition to some great street walking in the town, we had a special dinner at Le Colombe D’Or. This restaurant is famous for it’s decorations — an incredible collection of original paintings and sculptures by many of the greatest artists of the early 20th Century. Their collection was built when these budding artists (e.g., Picasso, Matisse, Calder), yet unknown, were trying to keep food in their stomachs while they all gathered and painted along the Mediterranean. A restauranteur’s decision to trade a steady supply of food for some of the struggling artists’ early works may well represent the most successful barter in French history.

After a few days, with the weather forecasts still looking dubious, we sent the land bound group off toward Venice, with plans to leave the following morning along a coastal route. This would make it a longer trip to Rome, but we could dodge weather more easily and it eliminated the risk of getting stuck on an island. But at 6 p.m. that evening, while kicking around a soccer ball at a field overlooking the harbour, we realized that the wind had subsided dramatically and we were looking out at calm seas and clear skies. This wasn’t what the forecasts had predicted, but it looked awfully inviting for a crossing. We and the boys sprinted to the boat and checked all our regular sources for forecasts — they all had just updated previous forecasts to reflect the accelerated progress of a stable front and 24 – 48 hours of clear conditions. So we gobbled down some dinner, and made our final preparations for a crossing — a much faster prep than usual. The boys were motivated to move quickly as they were excited about the prospect of getting to Rome ASAP in the hope of finding a place to watch their beloved Giants play in games 3 – ? of the World Series. So we left at about 9 p.m. with a 15 knot breeze, gentle seas, and an almost full moon beginning to rise into the sky — definitely our most spectacular departure from a port. We had a beautiful and uneventful sail with Deb and Steve trading off watches, and the boys keeping us company from time to time in the cockpit, although much of the time they were snoozing under heavy blankets. It was Deb and Adam who got to enjoy a spectacular sunrise as we rounded the tip of Corsica (SEE PICTURE SECTION). So ideal were the winds and weather that we decided to skip our intended stop at Bastia, on the north-east side of Corsica, and bee-line it straight to Elba. We pulled into Portoferraio at dusk, had a fabulous pasta dinner, and prepared to leave for mainland Italy first thing the next morning.

Our decisions proved fortunate, as our weather window closed sooner than had been predicted. As we left Elba the next morning, the winds and seas had a decidedly different feel. But our longer trip the day before left us with only about 15 miles to the mainland, and we decided to pull into the first reasonable port on the mainland (Punta Ala). The next morning we checked our weather sources and, while conflicting, most predicted brisk but reasonable winds and moderate seas. Anxious to get closer to Rome for baseball games and reuniting with the land travelers, we decided to brave it. We suppose everyone has to learn about weather the hard way.. Fortunately, we had no serious mishaps, with the only real casualties being the boys’ stomachs. It was ugly for a bit. And we both turned a bit green when we watched our wind meter pin its needle at 50 knots as the waves crashed consistently over our beam. The good news is we learned just how fabulously our boat handles in big winds and seas. While we weren’t exactly happy during the trip, we never felt at all in danger. But never before had we been so happy to see safe harbor as after this 25 miles of pounding into large and choppy seas with constant winds of 35-50 knots almost directly on our nose. Steve did a masterful job of docking the boat against the breeze and we breathed a huge huge sigh… but only long enough to be greeted by the Italian Carbinieri (harbor police), who were not exactly a smiling Welcome Wagon. After expressing displeasure that our ship papers didn’t include all they were looking for, we found ourselves being driven about 2 miles down the coast to their headquarters, where a dozen or so Italian men in uniform argued about what to do with the Americans on a Maltese flagged ship that had not yet formally registered in Italian waters. Of course this all took place before our intensive Italian lessons, so we had no idea what they were proposing to do with us. They appeared to have particular trouble comprehending that we were both listed as the captains of the yacht. In the name of getting back to our children and saving our home, Deb eventually conceded that Steve was the captain. Whether this was really the key factor we’ll never know, but the confusion did begin to evaporate, they returned our papers (with the critical new one) and passports, and drove us back to our boat. We had heard stories of arbitrary “fines” being applied in situations like these, but despite the consistently stony countenance on everyone involved, not a Euro was charged. We were quite relieved to get back to the boat where the only damage was at the hands of the boys, who had restocked their emptied stomachs with all the remaining cookies on the boat.

That night we took a train into Rome from San Stefano, our harbor of refuge, where we left our boat for the next few days. We arrived just in time to collect our daughter from Steve’s parents (who were now able to take their planned flight out the next morning) and to locate what is, to the best of our knowledge, the only all-night internet cafe in Italy. The next few days are sort of a blur, particularly for Steve and the boys who spent 5 of 6 nights between 1 and 6 a.m. watching their beloved Giants blow it. We spent much of this period in Rome, but also managed a short sail on the baseball day of rest to move the boat down to Porto di Roma – a brand new marina 30 minutes from Rome. We also saw quite a bit of Rome during this period, highlights including a great tour of the Coliseum and a visit to the Pantheon. Since our winter home is an easy day trip from Rome, we paced ourselves, taking in only one or two sites per day. After a day of mourning the outcome of the World Series, we spent two days sailing the boat from Rome to our current home in Gaeta, where we’ve been since October 30th.

Gaeta is all we had hoped for and much more. The children were immediately greeted by two other kid-boats who had been anticipating our arrival – a Dutch family with a boy of 10 and girl of 9, and a Norwegian family with a 15 year old boy and 10 year old girl. All cruising kids are comparably eager (desperate) to make friends, so the normal gender and age based barriers to friendships tend to disappear. We were similarly greeted by the small community of cruisers from all over the world who quickly made us feel at home. In fact, Deb had spent the last day of our journey with a patch over what we believed was a mildly scratched cornea, and we were thrilled that part of our welcome was the introduction to two doctors in our small cruising community. While our home-grown diagnosis and treatment was on the right track, it was nice to have a professional examination and corroboration.

Since Halloween was the day after we arrived, the kids were particularly happy to have other children with whom to pound the docks and reap the benefits of overly generous cruisers who doled out to our small group of trick-or-treaters a total supply more appropriate for the total population of a small American neighborhood. The community has continued to be, well, a community, complete with a daily morning “net” (9 a.m. check-in over the VHF radio), dockside barbeques, trivia night, and an amazing Thanksgiving potluck dinner; while Americans made up the majority, the 30 plus people in attendance represented 10 different nationalities and origins. We managed to find a small turkey and squeeze it into our propane oven. That it turned out OK is nearly a miracle given the size of the turkey relative to the oven and the fact that this was the first turkey Deb (or Steve for that matter) had ever cooked on her own. Though we missed our extended family with whom we normally spend this holiday, we had a wonderful time. The kids were particularly impressed by the assortment of people and foods — it was a truly international experience. A highlight for us was Danny’s 5 minute description to the assembled group of the history and meaning of the Thanksgiving holiday. One of the organizers had asked Steve to do it, but we thought it would be a great assignment for Danny’s schoolwork that day, and he did a wonderful job.

We are finding Gaeta to be just a great little town. While we hear it swarms with tourists in the summer, since we’ve arrived it seems like anything but a tourist town. The locals go about their business, and all the shops seem geared to serving them. There’s a great, narrow, cobblestone street that dates back to the 12th Century- Via Independenzia — that is the quintessential Italian shopping street. Over maybe half a kilometer, you find no fewer than 5 butcher shops, 4 bread shops, 3 pastry shops, 2 fresh pasta shops, 6 general markets, 5 barbers/coiffures, 10 fruit and veggie stands, etc. And oh yes, one decent sized grocery store. We stroll this street almost daily, if not several times a day, to pick up fresh food for one or two upcoming meals. Highlights so far include the mozzarella di buffalo and fresh tomatoes, and Pizza Rustica, a thick crust, brick oven pizza with really fresh and interesting toppings — sold by the kilo and we serve our family generously for about 10 bucks. In addition to this favorite street of ours, there is a fantastic white sand beach about a kilometer from the port, complete with a sand soccer field and virtually nobody ever on it. And the town feels very small and very safe (we’ve asked around a lot, and crime just doesn’t seem to be an issue) and the kids have a great deal of freedom to enjoy it.

Probably our biggest challenge here has been, if you believe it, not enough time. We are often envious of the other cruisers who, without kids, seem to have all the time in the world for all manner of diversions. Since arriving, we’ve been pretty good about doing roughly 4 hours of focused school time every morning. Until the week before last, two hours of that 3-4 days a week was taken up with Italian lessons. It was way over Sarah’s head, but Adam absorbed a little and Danny’s prior two years of Spanish at school put him in a great position to learn. His memory of vocabulary eclipses ours, so when he’s willing, he may be the best communicator in the family. Our afternoons are often spent on scheduled kid activities (more on this later). Each day we wonder where the day has gone, and after day we keep vowing that the next one we will spend on one of many we going to get to various projects on the boat gotten the kids into some scheduled small projects on the boat (let alone keeping it clean), just don’t seem to be getting done at the desirable pace. Of course we are sleeping a good deal more than we ever did at home.

In many ways we feel a bit torn between multiple communities. As we said above, the cruising community of about 15 boats is a wonderful and interesting group of people from all over the world. With the natural connection, we have spent the most time with the other couples with kids aboard, and feel lucky to have made in them some good new friends. We’ve also met some wonderful people connected to the small American Navy base here in Gaeta. One of the reasons we decided to come here was because we heard we’d be able to get the kids involved in some after school sports programs connected to the base. As our biggest regret about our first 3 months of cruising was the lack of companionship for the kids, we felt it important to make that a priority for the winter. The Navy community, used to welcoming new families all the time, has really embraced us like one of their own — we had no fewer than 4 Thanksgiving dinner invitations! Having never spent time around military communities before we really didn’t know what to expect there. But to be honest, whatever we did expect was too little — they are a really great group of people with whom we have already spent some very enjoyable time. And as we’re in Italy, we really want to build some meaningful bridges to the local community. We’ve met a few really warm people in town (Steve plays tennis with one) and we know there could be great opportunities to do more.

The kids have a bit of the same dilemma. They played in the last week or so of the Navy base soccer program, expect to join their basketball season beginning next week, and participated this past weekend in a flag football clinic they did. Sarah has also joined a Brownie Troup, which she is really enjoying, and the boys have gone to a Monday afternoon “open gym” for teens and pre-teens. In the meantime, they are all playing 2-3 days a week of basketball in the local town basketball program. Not sure they will be able to play in games, but they are welcomed at the practices. Adam is lucky that one kid in his age group has a British mom and speaks fairly good English. Danny and Sarah, on the other hand, have to rely on their limited Italian (Danny) and the universal language of sports. They also want (or sometimes feel compelled or pushed by their parents) to spend time with the other boating kids. Danny and Adam, not wanting to loose a step in the baseball department, are also playing a fair amount of ball in the large parking lot, with Steve leading drills and workouts most of the time. We clearly have created the kid interaction we were looking for, and only hope that we don’t create so much that it prevents the kids from adequately experiencing the local community and culture.

We’ve been trying to create at least one “field trip” a week, and have come pretty close. Trips so far include: a long weekend to Florence; an aborted bike ride to a nearby town called Sperlonga, followed by a bus trip there a week later; a day trip to Pompeii; and a day trip to pick olives at a nearby Abby (Deb and Sarah only). Pompeii was wonderful, mostly because the boys acted as our tour guide. Their schoolwork the week before had them each doing a short research report on the history of Pompeii. Danny also was “asked” to create a tour through that history. Florence was of course fabulous, though the highlight was probably a trip out of the city to visit with our captain Vieri and his family at their 300 year old home in a tiny Tuscan town of Montisi. We sat around the kitchen fireplace trying to speak Italian with them, then visited a truffle festival at the neighboring town and sampled a glass of the famous Tuscan Brunello. In Florence we did some of the classic sites, although all but Sarah and Steve had seen most of them a few months earlier. Both we and the kids really enjoyed shopping in the open air market, where we got much of our Chanukah shopping done. We spent a bit too much time with the boys chasing down things in places like Benneton (we had forgotten their duffel on the boat, so they had no clothes) and Footlocker. It led to a great conversation on the train back about balancing their need/desire to have “tastes of home” with not letting that get in the way of experiencing Europe.

Our bike ride to Sperlonga was a real experience. We set out with the Dutch family along the coastal road. With little by the way of a shoulder, and Italian drivers, it felt a bit precarious, particularly for Sarah. It really got dicey when we hit the first of three tunnels that burrow through the coastal mountains. After Steve walked with Sarah through the first, we were met by two polizia who tried to tell us, in Italian, that it wasn’t a good idea to ride through the tunnels with the kids. They were right! So they solved the problem by escorting us back through the tunnel, lights flashing and a line of cars behind them! We’re not absolutely sure, but we think they said they would have escorted on to Sperlonga, and back when we were through, except that they were nearing the end of their daily shift. We hope all law enforcement folks are so nice! Our trip back to Sperlonga by bus (again with our Dutch friends) took us to a small museum at the site of the remains of Emperor Tiberius’s seaside grotto, and some very well restored statues from about 2000 years ago. The olive-picking trip was set up by the a group of home schooling parents from both the Navy and local Gaeta community, and was a great outing for Deb and Sarah (SEE PICTURE).

While we are far less inundated by news reports than we would be at home, the precarious state of the world is painfully salient to us. Staring us in the face from our cockpit is the commanding ship of the 6th fleet, apparently the flag ship of the admiral in charge of the Med. Our new friends in the military, some of whom work in intelligence, provide regular updates on current level of security, letting us know when, if not why, levels have been upgraded. Big things and little things – like advice that our kids not strut around Rome in Stanford t-shirts- remind us that it is no longer a safe world for Americans. This is particularly true in big cities. Fortunately, in this local community, we rarely feel or experience directly anti-American sentiment. That was not true in other places, particularly in some of the French ports we visited.

Aside from the reality of the world and our daily ups and downs (and the occasional temptation to throw each other overboard for a very cold swim), we are very much enjoying the experience as it unfolds. When we drove stakes in the ground to make this happen, a year felt like an incredibly long time. Now, we are starting to say things like “We can’t believe that we’re more than a third of the way through!” It truly is incredible how much there is to see and do once you start traveling with a mindset that is broader than vacationing. If Deb didn’t have a job to come back to, and the kids wouldn’t fight for grandparental custody, we’d probably consider staying longer.

Enjoy the holiday season, and we’ll look forward to updating this with our future adventures.

Deb and Steve