Every year I have the opportunity to travel back to Italy with my family to visit my relatives and the region that my pedigree comes from. I have experienced the lifestyle in miniscule villages scattered throughout the mountainous regions of Teramo. I have even spent time tracking down a Marsicano bear in the Abruzzo wildlife reserve. This year, I veered off the path of trails and trees to the open ocean.
I am not too fond of the sea. The idea of endless kilometers of empty (and far too deep) waters is not something I particularly dwell too much on, so one can imagine my first thoughts when my uncle proposed a fishing trip on the Mediterranean. Due to my family tree being rooted in the coasts of Abruzzo - which means I come from a long line of fishermen - it was apparent that I could not refuse the offer. With every detail I could feel my stomach churn a little; “small boat, big fish, early morning out far, far, far into the open blue…” not too enticing for me personally, but a part of me wanted to go, nonetheless. New experiences, right? I agreed and, with some planning, I found myself spending the night before the trip in my uncle's apartment, not able to sleep for much time.
The next day, we woke up incredibly early in the morning, 5 a.m. to be exact. My uncle and I breezed down to the Atri countryside with our gear to meet my second uncle at the port. I was ready and excited to get out on the waters despite my previous worries, yet they came flooding back when I saw what we were planning to go “far, far, far into the open blue” with.
“I know you said a small boat, but I didn’t think you meant this small of a boat,” my uncle said. And it was true, our “great vessel” which we were supposed to use to best the tides with was about the size of a dinghy, barely able to fit all three of us and our gear. Not to mention, one small shift in weight here or there and we could probably expect to find a few men overboard. Due to its size, the hardest part of the entire trip was to load it up and get it moving, which took around 30 minutes alone.
Yet I can safely say it was incredibly worth it. The size of our boat in reality made the trip better, as while we were going out to sea, we saw dolphins with beautiful sleek tails that glisten in the sunlight and turtles that seemed serene and calm within their fortified shells. These animals I have never seen before in the Mediterranean, mainly because they can only be seen in the early morning when they leave their habitats to find food. But they also do not approach larger boats very often, and they felt comfortable coming close to our small dinghy; so close, in fact, that I could’ve reached out and brushed it with my hand. I wondered if this was what an Italian fisherman experienced every day. As much as the ocean scares me, I wouldn’t mind a job like that.
At the end of our trip, we caught a few fish, both welcome and unwelcome (we caught a Pesce Ragno, a fish with a pretty hefty sting. Safe to say we threw that one back in the water quickly), and I was exhausted by the time we hit shore again about six to seven hours later. I couldn’t imagine the strength that a mariner would need to do that type of work for an entire day, and I grew a newfound respect for the fisherman both in my own pedigree and the Abruzzo region.
Ultimately the trip was a success and holds an important part of Italian culture within it. What is often overlooked is that Italy is flanked on three sides by different oceans, so there is an increasingly large fishing culture in various regions of the southern European country stretching back many hundreds of years. Of course, they are not as popular as other parts of Italian traditions, but their dedication to the ocean is the reason for many culinary parts of society. Through this trip I learned that the ocean gives to the culture of Italy as much as any other aspect of the country's wildlife.
https://www.lagazzettaitaliana.com/travel/10259-your-usual-abruzzo-fishing-trip#sigProId45e449bb29
