SELENE
Aboard Celebrity SUMMIT there is a café we reported to every day: Café al Bacio. Whenever there was a gap in the day, we drifted over and sat down — a coffee, a biscuit, and time aboard slowed down.
The Striped Cups
The café's cups are easy to recognise: white with dark vertical stripes, Café al Bacio printed on the side. Latte art poured into a heart, a biscuit on the saucer, a marble-patterned table. A few days of this combination and it had become a habit.
From above, the usual scene: two striped cups, a teapot, a biscuit stick beside each cup, one coffee already half finished. This is the picture we repeated most often aboard.
Another day's cup: the latte art a heart again, a biscuit beside it again. Sit down and there's no need to look at a menu.
Tables on Other Days
On the afternoon we boarded, we sat down at Café al Bacio for the first time: two striped cups, a Café al Bacio menu, two bottles of water, on a marble-patterned table. The same afternoon's table again: two striped cups with a strawberry cake slice and a small round pastry, sugar packets in a small black dish.
Another day's striped plate held two small treats: a chocolate puff and a lemon meringue tart, with two striped cups behind — one coffee, one matcha. The café's treats are few, but each is made with care.
One afternoon's table: heart-shaped latte art, a matcha, a glass teapot steeping tea, and a pitcher of iced tea beside it. Tea and coffee on the same table was a combination we often had at this café.
Another day was a striped-teapot table: a matcha and a coffee, a chocolate biscuit stick beside each saucer, the teapot's stripes matching the cups. A matched set like this grows familiar over days.
By May 21 the café turned takeaway: two Café al Bacio paper cups, and two cups of pale green gelato in front of them. Gelato at the counter was an easy moment near the end of the sailing.
The Late-Night Coffee Table
Late at night the coffee table was still going: besides the latte art coffee, a matcha latte, a teapot and a glass pitcher of iced tea, a small yellow lamp on the table and blue atrium lights behind. Evenings aboard were spent slowly, at this table.
