We went to Capri to visit the Blue Grotto.  Capri is a twenty five minute ferry ride from Sorrento, located in the Tyrrhenian Sea, and has been a resort town since the Roman Republic.

There is evidence that the  island has been inhabited since the Neolithic Age, that’s 10,200 B.C. folks, and that is a long time ago and makes the Roman Empire seem like yesterday.  Seriously, the Roman Emperor Augustus developed Capri, building temples, aqueducts, villas and gardens and when he was excavating for his private villa, giant bones and evidence of stone weapons were found and later displayed in his garden.   After Augustus, Emperor Tiberius  moved to Capri because he was afraid of being assassinated.  He lived there for about ten years without leaving the island before he died.  He built a bunch of villas, one of which is rumored to have had a private tunnel to the Blue Grotto for awesome swimming.  We certainly did not treat our trip to Capri like a sport.

We took a boat tour around the island which was relaxing and informative enough.  We got to swim in the Tyrrhenian Sea and take a tiny little row boat into the Blue Grotto which was enough adventure for me.

This is the orange coral that grows all around the island.

There are some interesting cave formations around the island. You can see where there used to be a hiking trail through this cave.

These are the famous Faraglioni rocks, each with its own name:  Stella (star), still attached to the island,  Faraglione di Mezzo(middle) and Faraglione di Fuori or Scopolo.  Scopolo is the only place in the world where you can find a blue lizard called Podarcis sicula coerulea.  Unfortunately, we did not see this lizard.  Heck, I didn’t even know about this lizard until I was checking my spelling for the rocks.

We went through the arch in Faraglione di Mezzo…

…and we kissed under the arch because that will bring us eternal love.

We jumped off of the boat and swam in the sea.

The temperature was bearable, even for me.

We continued on around the island.  It was a beautiful day and there were only a couple of other boats that we saw, nothing like during the summer the guide told us.

We stopped at the Blue Grotto and transferred to a tiny row boat to go through a miniscule opening into a cave where the water is a brilliant blue.  You have to lay down in the row boat to get through the opening!  This is the entrance to the famous Blue Grotto.  Looks like fun, right?

There is a boat disappearing into the mouth of the cave.  I was not too excited about this little side trip but I wanted to see the blue water.

It was pretty cool inside.  There were about ten little row boats going back and forth, picking up people from larger boats and taking them into he grotto.

This is inside the Grotto.  Maybe it’s part of Tiberius’ secret passage to his private pool.  I did read on a website that people will wait until after the little boats leave in the evening to swim inside the grotto.

The blue water, hence the name Blue Grotto.  The Blue Grotto is blue because the mountain actually stops not that many feet below the water’s surface so that the sunshine hits the sand and the light is reflected back up into the cave.

One more stop for another swim.

Grant and I stayed dry on the boat while Scott and Ashley explored.

Our tour was over and we decided to get lunch, skip the hike, and go back to Sorrento.

The ferry ride back to Sorrento.

And the hike back to our apartment from the marina…roads…

…and stairs.  So even though we didn’t hike on Capri we still got some exercise.  We treated Capri like the Romans did, a relaxing little vacation.

Thank you to Simona, our very sweet tour guide with www.capritrip.com.  This family owned company gets great reviews on Trip Advisor and we really enjoyed a relaxing ride around the island.