The Ghost Hotel - 8th August

We had decided last night to spend the morning here as we don't have quite so far to travel today. Alex and I went to the well stocked camp shop for breakfast provisions and fresh bread for lunch. After breakfast we all donned our sun cream and swimsuits and walked to the beach. We had a lovely relaxing morning, the sea was warm and the sun hot.

Camp Ford was soon packed up and ready to roll again. The motorway didn't seem as bad today, maybe because it is the weekend, and we made good progress. There is a distinct lack of nice places to stop on Italian motorways. Either you can just pull off into a lay by on the hard shoulder to eat your lunch or visit a service station. Despite the heat, they have no shady areas. We ended up huddled under a small tree to eat our ham and cheese rolls, followed by an ice-cream and back on the road.

We arrived at Brindisi around tea time and checked the faithful crap nav for campsites – the nearest one was 30km away and back the way we had come. Chris rang them anyway but they had no space. We went to the port to see if we could sail on the earlier ferry but they are nowhere near as organised as us and after some pushy queuing I was told in no uncertain terms to “come tomorrow”.

A hotel it was then. Back to the trusty crap nav which helpfully took us all round the houses. Hotel number one didn't exist and hotel number two was derelict. We had already inquired at a hotel right near the port but Hotel Neptune had only doubles available at 145 Euro's each. We decided the only option was to head back there and see if we could negotiate a better price. It was a fairly new looking large hotel with only a couple of cars so we were counting on them being desperate. Chris went in and spoke to the young guy who pretended to call someone and then said they would put an extra bed in and we could have a double room for 185 Euros with Alex sharing our bed. Not likely! We said yes to the room and smuggled up a blow-up bed and sleeping bag. On inquiring at reception we were told that the restaurant was shut and we could have drinks in the bar but the didn't have any wine at the moment; just beer and fruit juice.

Off we went again to get some food. We had spotted some patio tables outside the hotel so we went and bought some pizza, wine and fizzy drinks and sat outside to fill our boots. We decided it would only be polite to visit the bar before bed. It turned out that the guy at reception was also the bag boy, the barman and provider of breakfast. We asked for Greek beer and after making a show of looking in the fridges, he could only offer us Heineken. At least we had all been able to have a lovely hot shower and had a nice bed to look forward to.

All the comings and goings at Hotel Neptune were enacted by Damiano, the tutti man, and the four Fords. No other guests, no other staff. On the upper floors sensors switched lights on as we passed and off as we went. Damiano did the same in the deserted ground floor bar and games area. It was bizarre. Was it a ghost hotel, would we be awoken by strange goings on in the night? Spooky!