The way Fabio Amitrano tells the story, he was walking on the beach on Ischia, the volcanic island where he was born off the coast of Italy. He spotted a young woman, as young men are wont to do, and noticed she was speaking English.
“I studied English grammar in school, and there were not many people on the beach talking English,” laughs the personable captain of the Coral Princess.
It turned out the young woman was from Okotoks, Alberta, Canada. She would become his wife, mother of his daughter, and they would go on to spend their married life more or less at sea. Princess captains work eight months of the year piloting a fleet of 16 ships.
Ischia is the largest island in the Gulf of Naples, 18 miles from the city (Napoli to Italians) and 18 miles from the Isle of Capri.
Population is 16,000.
“It’s a resort island, with hot springs,” says Captain Amitrano. “All the ladies come there to look younger. It must work, because they keep coming back!”
For him, the anticipation of life at sea came early.
“I knew when I was 12,” Amitrano explains. “At 14, I went to nautical school — because I lived on an island we were all going to nautical school — and finished at 19. I worked on a cargo ship, as a cadet, a junior officer. It was a company from Naples, and the company still exists.”
That was 1969. Initially, he worked on ships called Sylvania and Carinthia that became Fairwind and Fairland after they were sold to Sitmar, which was eventually sold to the P&O Group that — years later — was bought by Carnival, which also owns Princess, one of nine cruise lines that form the largest cruise corporation in the world.
This captain’s working life more or less followed the corporate growth.
“How many ships have I been on?” he asks rhetorically. “It was slow progress. I was on only two or three ships in the first five to seven years. In the 1990s, everybody shot up quickly. In the 1980s…very few. Then people started investing and the masses discovered cruising as a one-stop shop.”
That was when cruise ships became “like shopping malls.” They had everything for passengers, who got to visit other countries as part of the adventure.
“It’s essentially worry free…you just have to empty your suitcase,” he says. “There are few hotels that pamper you like this. In hotels, you come and go. There are more people on this ship than in the village where I live, and this is a small ship.”
Compared to the industry giants, the Coral Princess carries just under 2,000 passengers. Captain Amitrano is on his second Coral contract and expects he’ll be moving to another Princess ship within the year. Just like in a family, he rose through the ranks to become the father (or godfather as they might say in Ischia) of his ships.
Of them all, he still has a favorite experience.
“For two years I was in Polynesia.” he recalls. “It was the best time of my time at sea. Beautiful scenery and beautiful people on board and on shore. The ship was the Tahitia, now the Ocean Princess, and it carried 700 passengers.”
Like all captains, his a family at sea is a huge part of life: “The best thing is to work with good officers and good crew. When you have that you have everything.”
Keeping a traditional family together can be a test when the head of the family is gone for long stretches of time.
“A lot depends on the strength of the relationship.” Captain Amitrano says. “I have been lucky.”
Starting with that day on the beaches of Ischia.
DAILY DEAL:
Cunard Queen Mary 2
7 nights
December 12, 2011
Transatlantic: Southampton to New York
Inside $505
www.cunard.com