Upon arriving at the Tirrenia di Navigazione spa we were greeted with warmth and enthusiasm. The desk clerk assigned us rooms along the beach side. The men in our little contingent shared two to a room and I being a field grade officer got a suite all by myself. The room was comfortable and luxurious, at least for a guy from Independence.
The group planned on meeting in the lobby around 6:00 that evening to decide what we were going to do for dinner. I had a couple of hours left after getting settled in, so I called room service, ordered a bottle of some sort of Italian red, tried to tip the bell hop who refused my lira but did take a couple of American dollars.
I sat on the balcony in very comfortable chairs, watched the rolling Ligurian Sea and thought how nice it was to protect my country from the evils of communism. The only thing that disappointed me was that for being a nude beach there were no swimmers or sun bathers. It was in mid February and even close to southern Italy it was to cold for such things.
I left my room in plenty of time to meet up with my small band of brothers and explored the spa. There was a huge outdoor pool but no pool side loungers, a very large drinking establishment in the basement area but closed for the season, a work out room with no one there, no one in the sauna, a good sized restaurant, but again closed for the season. I started thinking that I might run in to Jack Nicholson, when I came across what was advertised as an American Bar. It was full.
After ordering some red wine it was immediately known to all in the bar that I was an American and for the next 45 minutes I never had to buy a drink. They were friendly and were not that interested in what I was doing in Tirrenia. They eluded to the fact that they knew I was a soldier and they were use to soldiers not being to specific on what they were up to or where they were from. I found out later Livorno, just down the road from Tirrenia, was the center for the Italian Communist Party. I gave no state secrets away.
My comrades and I met in the lobby and we discussed where to eat. No one but me was over the age of 21 so our food desires were not the same. One wanted to go back to Camp Darby because he saw a sign in the mess hall that informed everyone that it was Taco night at the bowling ally. Another saw a McDonald's sign as we came into town and thought that would be interesting. Yet another said he had walked a little bit around town and just down the block was a place that advertised American Pizza.
I was weary enough that I did not want to point out the obvious so I just told them we had been in each others company for over 24 hours and perhaps we ought to go our own separate ways that evening and meet up in the breakfast cafe which was on the second floor at six the next morning. Besides I said I was tired. I threw the senior sergeant my car keys and headed back to the America Bar for one more drink.
Breakfast was good. All you could eat buffet and part of the room price so we all were able to save part of our Per-Diem that morning. Eggs, bacon, sausage, something that looked like hash browns, oatmeal, flaked cereal, hard rolls, and, don't ask me why, pork and beans.
We piled into the BMW and headed to Camp Darby, that with pin and pencil we would begin doing our part to win the cold war.
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