5. Listing Port and Starboard

Friday, June 8
On the ferry to Isola del Giglio

Breakfast this morning was a musical affair. The sound system was playing a recording of the Beatles greatest hits. Not loud, but well modulated to the needs of those just waking up. Two of these people were rather large American women who seemed to be fans of the band. One walked around the room with a step that swayed to "Yellow Submarine" while a few minutes later, her friend sang along to "Hey Jude."

Back in my room, I had a minor panic. I couldn't find my passport anywhere. All European hotels require seeing it while others hold onto it for the duration of your stay. I had remembered showing it to the clerk last night, but was certain he had not asked me to surrender it. To be safe, I went down to check.

"Oh yes," said the young woman at the desk. "It is here". With that, she handed me a passport. A Nigerian passport. Since I'd never before been confused with a Nigerian, I was a little perplexed.

"You are 402, are you not?" she asked. It was more of a statement that I was wrong and not her.

"No, 301"

"Oh, scusame," she said. She checked and found it under the desk.

I rushed to get out to the bus. I needn't have bothered. The sign said that there would be ones at 9:15, 9:22 and 9:55 so naturally mine came at 9:36. I took this into the town of Porto Santo Stefano on Monte Argentario where I would get the ferry to Isola del Giglio.

The boat is more of a large luxury cruiser than a traditional ferry; three levels with the top one an open air viewing deck. According to weather.com, there would be a 10% chance of rain. The Italian weather gods apparently ignore this channel. Within a few minutes of leaving port the rains came and with these a very serious chop. Right now the waves are coming over the front of the boat and we're bucking like a bronco.

Given my reason for coming to Giglio, this is more than a bit nerve wracking.


Late Morning

The first sighting is literally disquieting.

For most of the crossing, people were cheering with every buck and wave crashing over the bow. When we were about two miles from Giglio, the passengers suddenly got very quiet and all attention was pointed toward the bow.

From a distance it looks like a breakwater, a long, flat strip just off the village at the base of the island. As we got closer, it became quite clear that the tapered front and rounded back marked the outline of the Costa Concordia, the massive cruise ship that ran aground and keeled over earlier this year. It took with it 36 lives, the bodies of two yet to be recovered.

The ship lies on its starboard side at an angle of approximately 30% off the surface of the water. What is most remarkable, beyond the shear sight of it, is how close to shore it rests. If it fell the rest of the way, the tip of the stack would hit the water less than fifty feet from the from the peninsula.

Right now, the future of the ship is a source of great concern. It is resting on a sandbar, balanced precariously on the edge of a 230 foot drop to the bottom. Since its keeling it has moved 24" closer to the edge. If this happens, the ship will sink and cause a major ecological and economic disaster. The fuel, currently being siphoned very slowly, would spill into the sea, and the wreckage would effectively shut off the port from the tour boats that keep the island alive. The most conservative estimates show that the salvage and dismantling will cost in the neighborhood of $3Billion. Since the owners have no way of paying for this, the costs will likely fall on an Italian government that can barely afford a cup of coffee at this point.

Right now, it sits there, an ironic tourist magnet that may ultimately destroy the tourist trade.

The ferry docked less than 200 yards from the wreckage. I walked along the seaside village street to a small jagged outcropping of rocks that mark the agreed upon vantage point. There the tourists gathered, mostly in couples. Each one posing and smiling with the wreckage in the background then passing on the camera to their partner to reverse the shot.

Yes, it's ghoulish and, yes, I'm here. I've never denied the side of my nature that's attracted to spectacle, even of this variety. In 2005, I was on a train skinning along a ridge on the way to Athens. We rounded a bend along an inlet. I was absentmindedly looking out the window when suddenly there appeared a keeled over cruise ship just offshore. It was one of the older types, the kind that held between 500 to 600 passengers (the Costa Concordia could hold around 3,000). The hull was sufficiently rusted to have been lying in that inlet for a long time. I never forgot the electric shock of seeing it.

I'm currently sitting in a little bodega on the edge of the water, the overturned Costa Concordia just a few hundred feet away. Beyond a few men in orange jumpsuits, there is little to imply that this is anything other than just another day in a small tourist spot. The sun has come out making the wreckage gleam in the light.

That may be the most eery thing of all.


Early Evening
On the ferry back from Isola del Giglio

Something interesting happened as the day wore on.

Nothing.

I imagine that it is part and parcel of any disaster sight. If you leave it alone long enough, people will stop taking notice. This morning, when the tour boats were coming in, the jetty and harbor were alive with people who wanted to see the Costa Concordia. By the middle of the afternoon, these same people appeared to show no more interest in the wreck than they did for any other site in town. The townspeople sold goods in the bodegas and the old men clustered around outdoor tables at the cafes and on the benches along the harbor. The tourists got out of as many clothes as was allowable by law and found places in around the wreck to sunbathe.

The treatment of the wreck by the locals bespeaks a thing that I love about the Italians: their ability to live in the moment. There is no noticeable sense of concern surrounding a keeled ship that can very easily destroy their economy and therefore their way of life. Everyone just goes about their business and will presumably deal with the consequences if and when they come. Until then, why worry about it?

One thing about the wreck that will shortly send me online. Just what was that ship doing so close to shore? I had assumed that it was coming in to dock, but there is no port that can hold anything larger than this ferry. Even if it was matter of tying up to the long breakwater, there would still be one big problem: the wide expanse of rocks that stretch several feet into the water. If the goal was to drop anchor and ferry the passengers to the land, wouldn't the ship have to be at least a half mile out? Just what was that captain trying to do?

I spent most of the rest of the afternoon walking around town, getting lunch and generally enjoying the quiet. The sun was bright but it was never very hot, just warm and pleasant. The breeze off the sea certainly helped. I also took the opportunity to pick up some things for Bridget and Liam, a task that was far more fun than one might expect.

And just for the record: sunny skies do not guarantee a calm sea. Unlike this morning's crossing, no one is cheering the bucking of the ship and the high waves that are knocking us about.

My guess is that we're all contemplating how much our ship is listing to port.