Claudio is a checker. And Claudio is now our friend.
We usually prefer our bathing spots to be small. Secret. Lovely. And with character. Well, I guess you can say Claudios beach has character, but more the character of a Tokyo train during rush hour.
The night before we had been out for dinner, playing pantomime to order our meals. Our italian and the waiters inglese were close to nada. Niente. Nulla. Thats how we met Claudio. He jumped in from the neighbour table, helped us order and as it been so nice to chat in inglese (or should i say italian with an inglese accent? ) he invited us to hang out the next day at his beach. The greatest in the area!
I was a little skeptical. Mom and twin were all over the idea. So off we went the next day. Arrived in Porto Caesaro, and it did not take long to find the orange umbrellone Caudio had been talking about. Only the sand we could not find. But we assumed it must be underneath the fields of umbrellones and parked the car.
Claudio was sitting at the end of the orange umbrellone alley on a small table sipping iced espresso and doing his job. Checking. But his boys were doing great. So Claudio was doing great.
The other thing Claudio would do was greet friends. So he did with us. Kiss to the left. Kiss to the right. Yelling out: Francesco! (And Something italiano we didn’t understand) Francesco left and uno momento later we enjoyed our iced espresso.
Afterwards Francesco escorted us to our front row seats, we settled in and found ourselves on a teleshopping beach. Actually better then teleshopping, as you don’t have to wait for delivery, but still do not need to move. Bikinis. Hats. Coconuts. Smartphone cases. Blow up swimming things. Sunnies. Ice cream. Dresses. A hairdresser.
Eventually we sneaked through the highway of walking shops and dived into the ocean in our new bikinis.
Thanks Claudio, we had a fabulous day!