In Milan, where you vacation in August is a bigger status symbol than where you live, what you drive, and whether the flagship Armani store has your address on file for deliveries or not. For the month of August, the city closes down. You can wander the deserted subways never seeing another human being. You can roll bowling balls down Corso Como and pitch a tent in Piazzale Duomo to camp out. No one, underscore NO ONE, is there. The chic Milanese have transferred to places like Lake Como, Rimini, Ricccone or even better, to Panorea, Formentera, Ibizza, Mykonos or, the classic choice: Sardinia.

Bartok and I had decided we wanted to do a ten day vacation just the two of us, no boyfriends allowed. This reduced our budget by a lot. Since I’m the planner in our relationship, I began researching possible getaways, utilizing our network of friends who could offer us jobs on the beach/shelter. I became intrigued by an island called Ponza off the coast of Rome, mainly because a friend of a friend owned a club there who’d pay us to play in the sand promoting his locale. I ran this idea by a close DJ friend of mine; we’ll call him Dr X. Dr X’s response went something like this:

“Ponza? Ponza!? No way girl. You got it wrong babes. You gotta go to Capri, baby. Capri’s the only place for you to be. You gotta do your beautiful thing there.”

I then explained our budget constraints.

“No problem, babes. You can stay with my pal Boris. We’re like brothers, man. I’m at his place every time I hit up the island, sweetie. He’ll give you and your girlfriend a room in his place cheap.”

Sketchy as it sounded, I emailed Boris who promptly replied he had availability for the nights I was requesting and that our room would be 100 euros a night, breakfast included. Us each paying only 50 bucks a night to frolic in paradise and not have to do any kind of manual labor seemed like a good deal. I accepted and we were on our way.

Our story now picks up where yesterday’s left off. We hopped a train from the Florence suburbs at 4.20 am (usually the time when we’d be coming HOME not going OUT) and caught the Eurostar down to Naples. Our train mate (we were sitting in a foursome complex) was a strong, clearly Neapolitan man with long greasy hair and the most attractive arms I’ve ever seen. About an hour outside Rome he gathered the courage to strike up a conversation with us (or maybe we struck up with him…can’t remember) and we learned he was indeed from Naples and that his life’s work was that of a butcher. So apparently hacking off animals ligaments gives you the best muscle tone ever. Bartok and I spend the rest of the train ride fretting over why we were both perversely attracted to this dirty, grease ball of a man who looked like a text book example of a violent ex-con.

I had tried calling Boris when in the vicinity of Naples to inform him of our arrival time since I knew neither where or exactly with whom we were staying. My only communication had been those emails with him two weeks prior. And he wasn’t answering his phone.

Uh-oh.

Due to our budget restraint and the fact the Neapolitan cab drivers are notorious for ripping people off, we decided to walk from the Naples train station to the port. The butcher said it was doable and pointed us in the right direction before tying his shiny hair in a ponytail and strutting off. I’m sure walking to the port was doable, but with the kind of luggage we had in toe (girls on vacation need lots of shoes) and the August heat, the walk seemed more challenging than those Iron Man competitions. Stopped at a corner to catch out breath, a young Neapolitan lad (already pulled over by the sidewalk) engaged us in conversation. After a brief chat and Bartok bumming a cigarette off him, he said we were near the port and he’d be happy to transport us the remaining distance as soon as his friend Berto (who he was picking up) arrived in his moped. So we spent about fifteen minutes chatting and waiting for Berto, who finally showed up after what felt like two hours. Neapolitans aren’t that great about being on time. And then we had to wait for Berto to go the Tabacchi and buy cigarettes. Then we had to wait for him to smoke one while relaxing outside on the hood of the car. Welcome to Italy.

These hospitable boys did however, drive us to the port and wished us well. I’m still grateful to them because I think my already persistent back problems would have been ten times worse had I been forced to carry my Capri luggage that entire distance. Bartok and I hopped on a high speed ferry, and in forty minutes, we were in paradise.

Capri’s town center is so high up on the island that from the dock you take a kind of on-the-ground ski-lift mechanism to get there (which I’m sure has a proper name). Before boarding this weird contraption with our luggage, Boris called me back. Later, when Bartok and I would discover the rules of this magical island, we’d know that it is completely inappropriate to contact anyone before 11 am. Boris said he’s meet us in the main piazza in fifteen minutes. How I’d know who he was, or how we’d recognize each other for that matter, didn’t seem relevant. We emerged in the little piazzetta having been up since 4 am with almost 5 hours of traveling under our belts and scanned the area for Boris-like looking individuals.

Luckily, it was he who spotted us.

To Be Continued…