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I'm feelin' miserable. When I wrote "How I became a rogue" someone said I was an integralist . Now I'll be labeled as a xenophobic chauvinist. My word of honor: I really did like the german people I speak of. I'm beginning to think that malice is in the brain of some readers. I love peril so here is:

Alone in an enclave.
by Giovanni Possenti (aka GIOANNI).

I'm feelin' miserable. Too often I'm alone. My wife is wrong when she says that I suffer of misantrophia because when in a group I'm always silent. The reason is that in a group I prefer listening instead of speaking.
It's all right for me but on the tour around Elba I felt really lonesome.
On thursday afternoon with my faithful Scupper on leash and wheels like an hemiplegic dog, or if you like it best a still hemiplegic centaur, I am in Portoferraio to meet a group of kayakers and finally circumnavigate Elba island on a nautical trek. I find there two old friends a new one from Milano and a nice cheerful german mistress speaking a nearly perfect Italian. We pack our kayaks and paddle were the greater part of the group are waiting 'cause they are here from yesterday.
They are all from Germany, finest kind, coming from all possible lander and jolly chatting in german. I do perfectly read german because it's ,unlike english, a phonetically written language but I don't understand what I'm reading. On their side they don't utter a word in english or italian. .
For me here this is not an unusual condition 'cause in thirty years that I have a house in Elba germans became the majority and so I'm part of an italian enclave into a german enclave.
So much for the enclave but let's go on to understand why I felt lonelier.
Quoting again JKJ, nobody, and I mean it, nobody must try to organize a trip reading what I write, it's incomplete incoherent and tragically unsuited for useful purposes.
First little step.
It's late so we can only reach "cala dell'inferno" access only by sea where a late comer italian catches up. Our fleet is really eteregenous ranging from swift kevlar kayaks with a minimum luggage to cumbersome 2 seats inflatable an foldable Kleppers with kitchen sink and boiler straight from world war two..
Second step.
Now tragedy strikes. After Cavo the cellular phone net is really good, my clients developed bad habits and so start to call me asking if they really must put the plug in the socket to get their computers working and so on.
I try to drown the obnoxious device but the Aquapack bag doesn't leak and I must kindly , in a way, answer.
Six calls are more than enough to see other paddlers disappear beyond the horizon. Must paddle like a devil 'cause most of the germans with the perfect instinct of oceanic navigators, knowing that the shortest course between two points is a straight line, cross from cape to cape always staying a quarter mile from the shore and obviously loosin' all the fun. Only a few elects see some interesting things I know of like a wonderful inlet with a sparkling sea bottom.

Perhaps you have noticed that I didn't say how many we were. In perfect truth I didn't know. You must know that I proudly belong to the non-association "Canoe-in-mare" which is organizing this trip and also says in it's statute that once on sea everybody is for himself and nobody may be held responsible. We offer help to organize but don't charge a cent and, while doing our best, we feel responsible only for relatives and very very close friends. (hope, only saying so, I'm not bending the rules and be reprimanded). Only the second day at lunch me and Annarosa had a approximate heads count ( to be more precise a holes count) and it was Germany vs Italy !5 5. Hope everybody, or more, reached again Portoferraio

I'm the expert in Elba, so I grab the handle and we camp in "Calanova" a strictly forbidden wonderful beach where I know nobody can see us. The only people there were the two guests of a nearby rented villa who, being deeply absorbed in shooting sunset romantic nude male photos, couldn't care less of us.

Third step.
It's saturday and still, with the cell silent, I am lonesome.
I have a SOT, it's hot, when I have a bath, following their path, the others paddle away (I like allitterating). Luckily the germans learnt how to behave and now follow my friend Sandro the arch-heretic like Lorentz's geese leaving every possible rock on the sea side They also religiously, or teutonically, follow a strict schedule with a Kapuccino-pause, Bad-pause, Mittagessen-pause, Bad-pause, Kapuccino-pause oder Eiscreme-pause (a wild opportunity to be transgressive) ; so I have time to reach the tail of the group without wearing off myself.
I try to camp in Galenzana (strictly forbidden) and a man warn us that here is a national park (mainly too near his villa) and if someone sees us and summons someone else the fines are really heavvy. How very fool of me ! How much I was longing for a shower and a night in an overcrowded camping !. And I wasn't realizing it !. We camp at "La foce lager".
Fourth jump.
Finally some waves and germans say that Elba is not like Elba. Later i realize that they were speaking of the "river Elba" big and usually placid.
But the wind turns and we can reach Procchio "Paolina Bonaparte Island" (forbidden) in a single step while a few years ago Sandro was stranded by mistral at punta nera for an entire day.
You are near my house and I'm really good at my new five feet barbecue, worth a stop and a phone call.
Fifth little step.
I rationalize.
It's monday.
I'm the only one with a SOT.
I'm very near Portoferraio.
It's the same old story.

Alone on a sit-on-top, out of Capo Bianco, talking of work on my cell , stark naked, no paddle float.

You become a heretic.

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