Haul taut the mainsail… Let's go at full throttle … Go to
the prow… I'm at the stern...
These are the orders Camilla, Michele,
Alice, Filmon, Wesley, Antony, Andrea, Luca, Elena, Lorenzo, Martina,
Giulia, Titti, Kevin, Debora, Marco Giulio and Francesco exchanged among
themselves.
Ten days in Rimini or in Bogliaco sul Garda learning how
to sail, the rules of the sport, the discipline and the rigours of the sea
but also student spirit, sharing, mutual help and friendship.
Blue Week
is the occasion to measure up to the daily challenges one faces
particularly with vision loss like these kids.
Their thoughts reflect
how enthralling their experience is: "I really had a lot of fun, and on
the last day Giulia and I cried because we didn't want to go home. Next
year, if they do this again, I am going."
"I was in Bogliaco, a hamlet
of Garniano on Lake Garda on the coast of Brescia. I was there because
every year Cavazza organizes a sailing course. I was with Francesco and
Giulio, my two friends who are blind, and I had so much fun with them
during that week; on the sailboat, but also during the free time we had
with mamma Cavazza. Unfortunately, while Giulio and Francesco talked I
slept soundly because I was so tired after the 5 or 6 hours of sailing we
did every day. However, when we navigated, a good part of me felt
physically tired because I looked so much at the beautiful town of Bogiaco
on the shore of Lake Garda which has three ports, one is municipal, the
other, in the south, is called Port 2000, and the last one, in the north,
is smaller and called Homerus.
Port Homerus, to tell the truth, was for the full
week my favourite port because the members of a sailing club called
Homerus the "independent sailing port for blind and visually impaired
people".
So, we went out every day on the boat and it was then that I
could dream endlessly looking at the landscape.
From the lake, the
landscape seemed to be made of so many eyes looking astonished at the
immense lake of gold, but the most beautiful thing was that the eyes were
ours. To me, at that moment, I felt like I was a king because we were
surrounded by such wealth of nature. However, I felt really good in the
middle of the lake, but the most beautiful part was when we went 2 or
3 miles away from Bogliaco, we discovered an even more beautiful landscape
enriched with small towns, lovely small villas or larger ones of the
eighteenth-century.
Unfortunately, my two friends on the boat with me
could not see the landscape, but sometimes when it was difficult even for
me to see our instructor described it to us and we were astonished by
everything around us.
But, when I could see something I immediately
told Franceso and Giulio; they asked me often to describe things to them
and I loved telling them."
