Well, it just drove me crazy not to know who was responsible for the sea cairns shown in the last post.  My source had told me that the artist was probably one of the members of the Associazione which has its headquarters next to the castello. So I went back there and hung around the club grounds for a while until someone turned up I could speak to.  I asked a few questions and was lucky enough to be invited in.

This Friends of the Castello group is a gang of men (I think all men, though I’m not sure, and they didn’t ask me to join), mostly retired, who enjoy boating and fishing.  And, as it turned out, making cairns in the sea.

I asked if the life-saving ring really was from the Titanic, but no one knew for sure.  It is very old, they said, and was given to them by an English friend a long, long time ago.  Nice to think, in this centenary year of the tragedy, that a relic of the great ship resides in Rapallo.  Being a sceptic, I doubt it… but it could be.

Now I know you’re just eaten up with curiosity, so without further chat, allow me to introduce Il Marinaio, creator of the ever-changing exhibit of sculptures in the sea:

His name is Michele (no last name offered and I didn’t like to ask).  He ‘fessed up to being the artist, and admitted that some of his work gets washed away by the tide every day.  When I asked him if he had a special reason for making these lovely sculptures he replied, “Beh! Passa tempo.”   But a friend tells me he likes to walk in the water to improve the circulation in his feet.  They both sound like good reasons to me.