Storming The Castle

I recently took a trip to Italy with my good friend and associate, Aramis. We stayed, for the most part, in a small town called Ortona, which is, historically, an important city in Italy because of its port and has been involved in many wars. Parts of the town were built over 1,000 years ago and the whole town itself was originally surrounded by a stone wall, which was built with any type of stone or rock that could be found laying around, including ancient roman ruins.

Ok, enough with the boring history lesson. Anyway one night Aramis and I found ourselves standing in front of this castle, weary yet intrigued. We had heard stories about ghosts and Pagan shrines found in excavation and at 4am, there ain't much to do in Ortona except jump a fence and trespass in a 1,400 year old castle. That or have drunken sex with some hot, slightly over-tanned, yet hopefully undersexed Italian woman, but unless it was between me and Aramis, ain't none of that mess was happening on our trip. (What am I even talking about??!?!?)

Either way, we're standing outside of this ancient, powerful symbol of times past, Aramis looking slightly hesitant - scratch that, not slightly, VERY! As per usual, I'm looking to get into some trouble, urging Aramis that the time is NIGH! I say we just go in, see how to actually get into the castle and take a quick look before we come back tomorrow for the real deal adventure. He regretfully agrees and we run back to Mario's to grab the smallest flashlight we could find. Actually, this town is so dead quiet at night that running would have been too loud and even our normal pace of walking was making way too much noise.

Let's do the math: Ancient, mostly destroyed, possibly haunted Castle + the darkness of 4am + Dead Silence = Indiana Jones!

I dream of shit like this. For real if anyone in Miami is into this whole "Urban Exploration" thing, holler at me.

So on we go, we hop the fence, which is almost a joke if it's meant to keep people out (did I mention the castle is closed to the public??), and take our first steps into the unknown. I think you can actually see a ghost in a couple of them. Or maybe a Dark Overlord.













One last thing before this post starts to get long-winded (as if it hasn't already). I was and still am under the impression that there would be rooms and chambers and cellars and torture rooms, but as you can see in the pictures, there didn't seem to be any of that. Where the pictures were taken is only a fraction of how far down the castle's foundations are and I am still determined to find such rooms, even if they tell me that some war called "World War 2" basically bombed out everything and it was all covered in dirt. I DON'T BELIEVE 'EM!!! This castle was built into a mountain and there's gotta be a secret passageway somewhere at the bottom or something. I guess I'll find out next year!