Tourists seeking Capri arrive at Carpi

by Caroline Prosser (staff) | Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

A GPS typing error resulted in a 650 km journey off course for two Swedes after mistakenly typing Carpi - an industrial town in the north of Italy - instead of Capri, the famed island in the gulf of Naples.

“It’s hard to understand how they managed it. I mean, Capri is an island,” said Giovanni Medici, a spokesman for Carpi regional government, told Reuters. “It’s the first time something like this has happened.”

The middle-aged couple only discovered their error when they asked staff in the local tourist office how to get to the island’s famous Blue Grotto.

“They were surprised, but not angry,” Medici said. “They got back in the car and started driving south.”