I booked my train from Rome to Bari, and a ferry from this Italian coastal city to Duress, Albania. The train ride through the Italian countryside was enjoyable and I arrived with five hours to spend before my ferry was to board.
Bari has a nice old town built alongside a fortress that dates back to the tenth century. The fortress/castle has seen adaptions over the past millennium based on what the owners of the fortress saw as its strategic importance and use. I wandered the old town and waterfront, having a nice supper, before heading to the port.
I learned that I should ensure I get the translation of the Italian in the confirmation emails from ferry services. I had what I thought was a ticket, but in fact was a receipt of the transaction. I needed to go, at least three hours before my ferry departed to another part of the harbour—two kilometres up the coast in fact—to get the ferry offices to provide a ticket and to validate my passport as a pre-check for border security. Having not seen this in the fine print, I was told I needed to check with the company the next day. I was not alone in this predicament, but that was not much solace. With the ferry offices closed until 0900, I had not much of an option than to spend the night in Bari.
I looked up accommodation and booked a hotel online that came up through Hotels.com. When I arrived at my destination just after midnight, I learned that the hotel I had booked no longer existed and that the new hotel that took it over did not have the booking. Fortunately this was resolved the next morning after some communication with Hotels.com—although through what I thought was predominantly a chatbot—and the hotel proper. At any rate, I was able to get a good rest and have a great breakfast before looking at how I needed to handle the ferry passage.
I received a fairly quick response from the ferry in the morning. I worked through the details of where I needed to go and what I needed to do to get my ticket. They weren’t charging me extra for my error which was nice, but I did have to figure out how and when to go their office across the harbour and come up with a plan for the day ahead.
For the morning I chose to visit the Swabian Castle, the official name of the Fortress in Bari. It had been built on the Roman castle on the waterfront in the 10th century. Expanded by the Swabians in the 11th century and made into a castle for a prince tied to the Kingdom of Aragon in the sixteenth century. Finally in modern times the port was built along with a road circling castle and old city making the fortress no longer on the waterfront. It was fascinating to see the changes over time and hear more of the history as I toured the site.
In the afternoon, I thought I should ensure I had an early sense of where I needed to get my ticket. I walk along the coast brought me to the part of the port of Bari that had the ticket office. Still a bit confusing but a guard pointed me in the right way. Getting the ticket was easy and a bus was available to drive you up the port to the end where you could get on the ferry. With a few hours to kill, but with my ticket in hand, and temperatures according to one store’s board at 40 degrees Celsius, I primarily took it easy. Having a coffee, then a fruitless search for a book store, followed by a couple beers and a supper at a craft beer restaurant I had passed by earlier in the day at the end of the old town.
Around 2100, I picked up my bag from the hotel and headed to the port. It was a bit early but I wanted to ensure I got on the nice ferry to Duress. A few hours later, I was boarding the ferry and heading back to Albania.
BorealHiker 