Travelogue: Elba

First things first: I kind of hate most travel blogs. OK, “hate” is a strong word, but I have embarrassingly little patience for them, especially considering that I love to travel, I love to read/write and I love blogs in general.

This may make me sound like a bad person, but reading painstakingly detailed accounts of other people’s fabulous travel adventures is just boring. It’s like listening to a play-by-play account of someone else’s dreams or sitting through a painful slideshow (set to music, no doubt) of bunch of pictures you’re not in. Yes, I am selfish and have the attention span of a goldfish. And you totally agree with me; admit it.

I do like hearing about exciting places and travel shenanigans and, especially, delicious food and drink; I just want a bulleted list of the high points — where to stay, what to eat/see/do, how to get around, what to avoid. Think inverted pyramid.

Whew. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I’m going to enthrall you with wordy, poetic, self-indulgent tales of all of my travels. Don’t worry; I won’t leave out any details, no matter how insignificant.

Seriously, though, I would like to write a series of short posts that create a snapshot of the places I’m lucky enough to visit while living in Italy. A few photos and some good recommendations (or advisories) — information that I hope might be helpful if you’re planning your own trip. I will do my best to keep the obnoxiousness to a minimum. Tell me if I don’t.

First up…

ELBA: May 28-30, 2011

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Apparently, Elba is an island in the Tuscan Archipelago, an hour ferry ride from mainland Italy. Napoleon got exiled there for a hot minute (less than a year), and now tourists go there to sunbathe and snorkel and do islandy things. I knew nothing about it until my friend Molly told me I had to go there when I moved to Italy. Good work, Molly. It was awesome.

Getting There

Brian and I drove our car from Naples up to Piombino, a city about 3 1/2 hours north of Rome. Then we took a Mobylines ferry with our car to the port city of Portoferraio on the isle of Elba. Mobylines was fantastic: efficient, organized and easy. It cost about 18 euros round-trip per person, plus 26 euros to bring the car.

Portoferraio marina

Where to Stay

We stayed at Hotel Crystal, in Portoferraio, which was very close to the port. We got a decent rate on Booking.com and it was a really cute, clean hotel with a good breakfast included. The only complaint I had was that the air conditioning either didn’t work or the management wouldn’t turn it on when we asked (the guy at the front desk told me they could only turn it on at certain times… and we never encountered those times). It was pretty toasty in our room so we left the windows open at night, and the mosquitoes were very grateful for the free buffet I provided for them. Ah well. I still liked the hotel.

Portoferraio was adorable. It wasn’t as busy or touristy as other island port cities I’ve seen, and it was a pretty place to walk around, grab a drink at an outdoor cafe and eat at a homey trattoria for dinner. I also enjoyed the other port city, Capoliveri, and the tiny, peaceful town of Marciana Marina.

What to Do

There are a few Napoleon sights/sites, but we didn’t seek them out. We only had a couple days in Elba and were more interested in driving around the island, eating and going scuba diving. I highly recommend renting a car or scooter for a day if you don’t bring a car. It’s a beautiful place, and it was fun just driving around and stopping to take pictures and poke around the little towns.

If you scuba dive, we had a great experience with Bluelba Diving. An awesome German divemaster (also fluent in both English and Italian) took us out on a boat with just one other diver and the boat captain, and we did two dives in clear, beautiful, very cold (by Hawaii standards) water. We saw some eels and an octopus and some other critters, and it was a cool way to check out a different side of the island.

Getting the authentic windblown look

We also tried to hike to this crazy castle up on a hill that our German friend told us was a 15-minute walk. We drove all over the place to try to find a trail that didn’t require rock climbing. And failed. So we gave up and drank some wine and watched the sunset on the side of the road. It was not too shabby.

Ooh, look, a castle!

Ooh, look, wine!

Where to Eat

We had an excellent dinner our first night in Portoferraio at Osteria da Libertaria. Delicious fish, cheap house wine and a quiet outdoor terrace.

Overall, Elba was a relaxing, picturesque beach getaway that is very accessible from mainland Italy.