Sicilian Diary
Day 1 - Saturday
Our holiday begins today, as all the best holidays do, with the alarm going off
at an unearthly hour and us piling sleepily into the car with far too much luggage. The
run down to Gatwick airport was easy and we’d thought to book parking ahead,
although I am paranoid that something will have gone wrong with the booking and
when we try to leave the car park again in two weeks’ time we’ll get charged
hundreds of pounds. One day I really must go somewhere you can fly to from East
Midlands Airport.
The flight was happily not delayed and was even more happily not with
Ryanair. Instead we flew with Air Malta, who actually provided us with food and inflight entertainment and back-of-seat pockets to keep our bits and pieces in.
Admittedly the food wasn’t great and the entertainment was a documentary about
wild pigs rather than the latest blockbuster, but at least the back-of-seat pockets were
top-notch. We landed at Catania airport without incident unless you count my ears
hurting a lot as they refused to ‘pop’. Our luggage had not got lost and nothing had
leaked. Collecting the hire car, however, was a bit more of an adventure. We had
booked via holidayautos.com who had found us a cheap deal with a company called
Targarent. Neither of us had ever heard of this company before, and their counter in
the car rental building was the only one without a queue, which was convenient, if a
little ominous. The man at the counter showed us a diagram of the car and marked on
all the scratches, which turned out to be… on every side of the car. I took this as a
good sign as it means we can bash the car about a bit and it won’t notice. Judging by
my previous experience of Italian drivers, plus the fact that this will be the first time
I’ve ever properly driven on the right (driving in America doesn’t count as all their
roads are half a mile wide and perfectly straight and flat and you don’t even need to
change gear), this is definitely a bonus.
When we got to the car, it turned out to be day-glo orange. Another bonus as it
will be very easy to find in crowded car parks. We inspected the numerous scratches,
loaded up all our stuff, got in, switched on the engine and were confronted by a little
flashing red light in the shape of an oil can and a message on the dashboard screen
which presumably translated as ‘I need more oil now please’. We then unloaded all
our stuff again and trekked back to the office (of course the car was at the very far end
of the car park). I stayed in the office looking after the suitcases, weighed down by
that peculiar feeling of exhaustion which comes of having got up far too early in the
morning and spent many hours travelling only to be confronted by some irritating and
unforeseen problem which will only lengthen the time between now and a hot shower
and a cold beer.
Simon accompanied the car hire bloke back to the car, where apparently the
bloke just got in, turned on the engine and said not very convincingly that it would be
fine. Simon accepted this and came back to announce that we would take the car after
all. At the time I assumed that he had had some strong reassurances although when I
subsequently found out the truth I was a little concerned that the thing would conk out
on us at an inconvenient moment at some point over the next two weeks. Perhaps it
was for the best that I didn’t discover this until a few days later.
The hire car got us from Catania airport to our home for Week 1 of our
holiday, Siracusa (aka Syracuse, home of Archimedes). We’re staying in the Ortigia
area, essentially the ‘old town’ which is situated on a separate island, joined to the rest
of the city by three bridges. It has an enormous semi-underground car park called
Talete which is free during the day and only 1 euro per night. What a bargain.
Our holiday apartment is just yards from the sea (though no beach, sadly, just
harbour walls) and is clean and well-furnished though very dinky in size. The kitchen
is as big as your average broom cupboard and the bedroom is a mezzanine level
suspended rather too close to the ceiling (we will be banging our heads a lot this
week!). The TV however is full-sized although unfortunately it doesn’t come with an
automatic translator. We end up watching a lot of MTV as it’s the only channel which
is predominantly in English, although admittedly it’s perhaps better not to understand
Lady Gaga singing ‘I’m bluffin’ with my muffin’.
To ease ourselves into the whole holiday scene, we of course went out for a
pizza, the first of many. We checked out a place called Il Cenacolo which the nice
woman who owns the apartment recommended to us and I can happily confirm that it
does very tasty pizzas.
Day 2 – Sunday
Ah, there’s nothing like the feeling of waking up in the morning and knowing
that you have two whole weeks of holiday stretching ahead of you. So much to see, so
much to do… but not just yet. Today we opt to simply explore Ortigia. It’s a nicely
compact area, very easy to navigate on foot, with a handsome Duomo (that’s a
cathedral) and piazza at its heart. There’s a pleasant promenade along the harbour
front and a spot called Fontana Aretusa. This is named after a nymph who ran away
from a predatory river-god called Alpheus, got turned into a spring by Artemis to save
her, and then raped in watery form. I don’t think Artemis really thought that one
through properly. In case you’re thinking that sounds like a rather strange myth, I can
assure you that it’s fairly par for the course. Most Greek myths are just a load of
stories about strange transformations and anatomically improbable sex between say, a
woman hiding inside a wooden cow and a prize bull. I’m not making this up.
The peculiar tastes of the ancient Greeks aside, Fonte Aretusa is a nice enough
spot these days. The spring feeds a pool which is filled with ducks and genuine
papyrus plants (yes just like the Egyptians made into paper). Next door is a small
park, a sea-front piazza with plenty of benches for canoodling in the evening, and an
aquarium. We visited the aquarium, which smelled strangely of vinegar. It won’t be
beating The Deep in Hull or The Blue Planet in Chester, two top aquaria of my own
recent experience, to any international aquarium-of-the-year prizes, but it was a
diverting enough way to spend a few minutes.
However, when it comes to attractive seafronts and impressive baroque
churches, Ortigia definitely has both Chester and Hull beaten. The Duomo is a
delight, the façade is all fancy swirls, more like cake icing than stone, but the side
walls have the massive solidity of ancient monuments. Another church nearby, the
Basilica of Saint Lucia, had on display a painting by Caravaggio of the eponymous
saint’s death. His dramatic portrayal made a refreshing change from all those
mediaeval depictions of her holding up her eyes on a plate like grisly hors d’oeuvres.
An unusual feature of Ortigia on this particular day was an extremely loud
roaring sound which could be heard all over the island. It turned out to be a load of
power boats speeding round the harbour. Some girls in unnecessarily short hotpants
gave us some flyers and it turned out that this was the aquatic version of the Grand
Prix, happening right here, right now. We were delighted to be able to decipher from
the leaflet that the British team are leading the world championship and watched the
racing from the promenade for a little while, along with a few dozen others. After all,
it’s not often you go on holiday and find you have the unexpected chance to cheer on
the Brits in an international sporting event. Unfortunately once we had identified
which one was which the appeal of watching a load of boats going round and round
some buoys for hours on end palled. No wonder it’s yet to catch on as a rival to the
World Cup in popularity stakes, although I have to say it wasn’t any less thrilling than
any car race I’ve seen.
We sampled some traditional Sicilian culinary delights, including arancine.
This literally means ‘little oranges’ and they are very popular, we were to see them on
the counters of most of Sicily’s cafes. Contrary to the name they are actually balls of
rice which are filled with cheese, spinach, or meat sauce, and then deep-fried. Then of
course left to sweat under the glass of the café counter for a few hours until being
blasted in the microwave and served in a piece of tissue which goes transparent
immediately. They are very yummy in that particular way which only appalling
greasy things are.
More upmarket was the dinner we had at a restaurant called La Foglia. It’s
decorated like some mad aunt’s attic and the food was over-priced but tasty – my
frutti di mare pasta was great. And they gave us a free postcard, which was sweet and
saved me having to pick out a different card for all my various relatives.
Day 3 – Monday
Today we went down to Ortigia’s traditional street market, kind of like an
English farmers’ market only without the pretension. And the farmers. There were
lots of fruit and veg stalls, a couple of trailers selling salami cheeses and bread,
several fish stalls, each with at least one whole swordfish, and a tiny stall at the end
which sold nothing but raw sea urchins (very salty and unexpectedly orange). In case
you got overwhelmed by all the colour and freshness, there were also a few places
selling the sort of ‘fell off the back of a lorry’ crud you get at a standard English
market. We practised some Italian words, and got rather confused by the fact that the
word for ‘peach’ is almost exactly the same as the word for ‘fish’ (pesche as opposed
to pesce). And of course we took the opportunity to sample the local specialities,
including prickly pears, or fiche d’India (yes, that means ‘figs of India’). These were
not a success. I suppose we should have been warned by the name, but we really
weren’t expecting them to be so very prickly. They look quite smooth but actually
there are covered with tiny little spines which not only hurt when you touch them,
they break off and dig into your skin like splinters and continue to prickle you all day
long. I spent about half an hour with a pair of tweezers getting the little buggers out of
my hands but every time I picked something up for the next couple of days I
discovered one that I’d missed. Needless to say I am not buying cactus fruits again in
a hurry. It also turned out to be a waste of money to get them from the market as they
grow wild all over Sicily, much like blackberries only a great deal more evil.
We spent the heat of the day lolling on a beach near a place called Pachino, in
the extreme south of the island. The water was beautifully clear and calm and there
was hardly anybody about. This was how all beaches should be. Then later in the
afternoon we went to Noto, a small town which was completely destroyed in the
earthquake of 1693 and then rebuilt all the Baroque style. If you want to see the most
fantastically exuberant architecture and eat delicious pistachio ice cream, Noto is the
place for you. A ticket recommended by the tourist office got us in to see the interior
of the theatre, a medium-size room in the town hall with a painted ceiling that was
rather grandly billed as the ‘hall of mirrors’ (it had two mirrors on opposite walls),
and a small museum filled with sculptures by an artist whose name sadly escapes me.
We also accidentally wandered into a modern art museum while trying to find the
entrance to the cathedral. Noto’s cultural attractions might have been rather
underwhelming, but the Duomo was gorgeous, especially in the evening light, and the
carefully designed main street was undeniably a pleasure to walk along. And did I
mention the pistachio ice cream? If you’re ever in Noto, go to the Café Fontana and
try it, you won’t be disappointed. Dinner was a plate of mixed roast fish – prawns,
squid and swordfish – and some salad. We ordered the salad because it was
intriguingly described on the menu as being ‘rocket and icing’. This was obviously a
mistranslation of the word cilieghi, and we wanted to find out what this in actually
was. It turned out to be cherry tomatoes. How they got ‘icing’ out of that I don’t
know. Then we realized that we’d spent about 200 euros in the first few days of the
holiday and we should really try to be a bit cheaper for the rest of the fortnight, which
will mean less ordering random salads and expensive fish dishes and more cooking
stuff for ourselves.
Day 4 – Tuesday
Time to venture off the little island of Ortigia and explore the rest of Syracuse!
We drove up to the city centre, passed by the weird-looking concrete cone which is
the Sanctuary of the Madonna of the Tears, and decided not to go inside on the basis
that if you don’t believe that the statue housed within actually cried, then it might be a
bit of an anti-climax. Simon refused to go into the catacombs on the basis that it
would be too creepy for him (he is delicate bless him), and so we went into the
archaeological museum. This is housed in a bizarre honeycomb-like building made of
interconnecting hexagonal rooms grouped around a central lecture theatre. Some of
the exhibitions were closed for refurbishment, which was long overdue. The place
looked like it hadn’t been done up since the 1970s. Modern museum display practices
(such as, you know, making it interesting) were sadly lacking. It was just a load of
black-and-white pictures of archaeological sites, and then a bunch of broken pots in a
display case. Now I know it’s disgraceful that I’m a complete monoglot, but still, the
English translations of the labels weren’t great. I could barely understand most of
them and anyone less knowledgeable about ancient Greece would have been entirely
stumped. Describing something as an ‘oinochoe’ isn’t particularly helpful if you have
no idea what an oinochoe is (it’s a wine jug in case you were wondering). Normally I
love museums, but this one made me agree with all those kids being dragged around
museums the world over saying ‘this is booooring why can’t we go to the theme
park’. I just hope their refurbishment is a big improvement, because right now it’s
rubbish.
Much better was the actual site of ancient Syracuse. There’s the remains a
temple of Apollo on Ortigia near the market which we had seen earlier, but the main
ruins are a mile or two to the north-east, on a hill overlooking the harbour. It’s a fine
spot, both for scenery and defensibility. There’s even a freshwater spring still gushing
out of the rocks where you can dunk your head if the midday heat gets too much for
you. Highlights were the Greek theatre built into the hillside, the Roman
amphitheatre, and a cave known as the ‘ear of Dionysus’ because it apparently looks
like an ear. Personally I thought it looked like a cave but then what do I know? The
story goes that Dionysus, the tyrant of Syracuse back in the fifth century BC, used to
imprison people here because the acoustics of the cave meant that he could hear
everything they were gossiping about. This story sounds rather silly to me but the
cave was impressive nonetheless.
Mindful of the bank balance, we dined on fresh tuna and vegetables we bought
at the market in Ortigia this morning, and some pasta we got at a branch of Spar. Well
you can’t always be authentic can you? It was very tasty in fact.
Day 5 - Wednesday
More ancient ruins today, but a much longer journey to get there. Sicily’s top
ancient site is Agrigento, which is sadly right over the other side of the island from
Syracuse. Nonetheless I was determined to see it so we set off for a three hours of
enjoying the Sicilian roads. Road designers in Sicily have an approach best described
as whimsical. They enjoy creating motorways with no road markings and randomly
variable speed limits, and they forget to signpost important turnoffs. Fortunately as
Agrigento features several huge Doric temples perched on a ridge it’s easy to spot, but
we did get a bit lost en route. When Simon was driving, he came up with the
memorable if logically suspect motto ‘The faster you drive the wrong way, the faster
you get there’. When I was driving, he just got frustrated that I was too nervous to
overtake a lorry because at the crucial moment there was a sudden cloudburst and
visibility was about the same as being inside a carwash. Simon is far keener on
overtaking people than I am and after this decided to drive the rest of the way himself.
The site, thankfully, was worth the journey. It has some of the finest Greek
temples in Italy, matched only be Paestum on the mainland. It was boiling hot – like
all English tourists we have a habit of looking round sites during the hottest part of
the day – but the temples were well worth the walk along the ridge. The temple of
Hera, at the very end of the ridge, has a number of red stains on it which are allegedly
scorch marks from when the pesky Carthaginians torched the place. I don’t know if
that’s true but it’s a good story. The only complaint I would have is that the labels
were too sparse – ‘Temple of Chthonic Deities’ doesn’t really mean very much to the
vast majority of people. This paucity of information leaves it as an impressive but
meaningless monument to most visitors, like Stonehenge. The difference is that a
relatively large amount is know about life in ancient Greece, so the guardians of these
places could really do a lot more to bring them alive to all the tourists who currently
just tramp over them, take some pictures and then go off for an ice-cream without
gaining any understanding of what they’ve seen.
The accompanying museum was excellent – it had one of the best collections
of Greek pottery I’ve ever seen. Simon is never too interested in old pots but I was
enchanted. I love the attention to detail and the touches of humour in the vase
paintings. It’s fun to spot figures from myth – although the labels failed to explain
that Dionysus the god of wine was not the same person as Dionysus the tyrant of
Syracuse – but I my particular favourites were the scenes of everyday life, like the
young man pulling on his greaves ready to go off to war. Highlight of the collection
was an enormous krater (that’s basically a punch bowl) depicting Achilles killing the
queen of the Amazons and falling in love with her at the same time. The museum also
has an interesting reconstruction of how Agrigento’s uncompleted temple of Zeus, the
largest Doric temple ever, would have looked if they had ever managed to finish it.
Some of idea of the scale of the thing is given by the enormous ‘telamon’ statue of a
man braced against the ceiling. The temple would have had forty such statues. I hope
the folks at Siracusa’s museum of archaeology made a day trip to Agrigento to see
how museums can be good. To be fair, Agrigento’s main advantage is that is simply
has a much better collection, but there is still an awful lot Siracusa’s museum could
do.
We broke the long drive home by stopping off in Enna, a town of the interior
situated high on top of a hill with a looming Norman castle. Unfortunately it was
cloudy and dark so the billed views were not visible. The guide book sent to us to a
pizzeria called, strangely, Tiffany’s, where I paid 5 euros for the best pizza I’ve ever
tasted, bar none. I’m going to be thinking about that pizza for years as I do whenever I
have something truly delicious. It had a wonderfully crisp base, the freshest
mozzarella, the tastiest tomato sauce, the juiciest salami… excuse me my mouth is
watering. We got back at about midnight, tired but pleased with our day.
Day 6 – Thursday
After yesterday’s long journey and culture overload, it was time for some
seriously committed lazing about. We spent most of the day just lying the in the house
reading our books. I had tried to bring reading material that was suitably Sicilian so I
had The Godfather and The Leopard, two very good and very contrasting books.
Simon had Stuart Maconie’s two books about travelling around the north and the
south of England, Pies and Prejudice and Adventures on the High Teas, which I
thought were inappropriate but he enjoyed them. When we could finally be bothered
to go outside we went to a nearby beach called Fontane Bianche where the water was
disappointingly full of seaweed and the sand was covered in fag butts. The Italians are
certainly fond of a cig or two and unfortunately in the Mediterranean there are no
tides to wash everything out to sea.
Dinner was a beef stew which we made ourselves. Cheap-tastic and
surprisingly tasty. We’ve saved plenty of money today so we’re still just about on
budget. It’s very boring to be watching pennies all the time while on holiday but it
beats having a nasty shock when we get home again and check the bank statements.
Day 7 – Friday
Another long road trip today, to see some more ancient sites as recommended
by the trusty guide book, which hasn’t let us down so far. The hire car on the other
hand gave us quite a panic when the oil light starting flashing urgently on the
autostrada. We pulled into a garage, where Simon was annoyed to discover that they
didn’t sell motor oil or indeed any car-related items other than petrol, just soft drinks
and chocolate bars. Thankfully, when we checked the dipstick, the oil level was
actually okay so we decided the car was just asking to be serviced and would
probably keep going for another week. We made it to our destination without further
alarms.
Ancient Site Number One is Morgantina, another Greek/Roman city tucked
away in the interior. It’s very quiet – we were practically the only people there – in
contrast to the crowds at Agrigento. There’s nothing there which is nearly as
impressive as Agrigento’s huge temples, but it’s quite charming nonetheless. You can
see the tiled floors of a posh villa, complete with writing saying ‘Welcome’, the
remains of a covered market, stand on the speaker’s platform at the assembly place,
and walk inside a huge kiln which was used for firing roof tiles. There are large signs
up with pictures of how the city would originally have looked, and text which has
actually been well translated into English. It’s a model of how these sites should be
presented. Agrigento should take note, but then it’s got its flashy temples so I guess
they have no trouble attracting visitors, unlike Morgantina’s low-key charms. The
ticket to the site also included admission to the small museum at a town called
Aidone, about which all I will say is that it definitely wasn’t worth battling through
another torturous Sicilian one-way system.
After Morgantina we went on to Ancient Site Number Two, the Villa Roman
del Casale. It’s a Roman villa (duh) which has some famous mosaics, situated near the
city of Piazza Armerina. This proved to be a little more difficult to find owing to the
whimsicality of Piazza Armerina’s signage policy – at a crucial junction the sign
pointing towards the Villa Romana was substantially smaller than the sign pointing to
a random pizzeria. Unsurprisingly we missed it and found ourselves driving out of the
other side of the city with no real idea where we were going other than it was the
wrong way. On turning around we saw a sign saying ‘Welcome to Piazza Armerina,
the City of Mosaics’ which prompted a by-now rather stressed Simon to shout ‘City
of Mosaics! Well where the fuck are they?’ A few passes through the relevant
junction later and we eventually spotted the tiny sign and found our way to the villa
about half an hour before closing time. It was well worth the effort of getting there
though – the mosaics were spectacular. The place is enormous and the mosaics cover
hundreds of square metres with wonderfully detailed depictions of hunts, fishing
expeditions, mythical battles, gods, monsters, and, for some reason, girls in bikinis
doing athletics. It was all beautiful and incredibly well-preserved. The presentation
could do with some working on as the villa itself is strongly reminiscent of a building
site, but I guess as with Agrigento, when the raw material is so good that they have
parties of Americans wearing badges with their names and states written on being
giving guided tours, they don’t feel the need to do a whole lot to enhance the
experience for the average punter.
Outside the villa is a gauntlet of tourist stalls, where we paused to buy a
tasteful fridge magnet with an appropriate mosaic-of-fish motif. One guy was selling
peaches and I am ashamed to say that we fell for his juicy wares and paid 1 euro each
for the privilege. In the centre of Piazza Armerina was a guy selling peaches from the
back of a trailer at 2 euros for 3 kilos, which shows what idiot tourists we were. But
then I figure when you go on holiday you’re inevitably going to get ripped off a
couple of times so you just try not to worry about it too much. And we managed to
keep our costs down overall by eating the leftovers of our beef stew for dinner.
Day 8 - Saturday
Our last full day in Siracusa. I was annoyed to find that the Latomie dei
Cappuccini caverns are closed on the weekends, as I really wanted to visit them. Not
to see where the Capuchin monks established market gardens, but because these were
the old quarries where the Athenian soldiers of the Great Expedition were imprisoned
in 413 BC and most of them died horribly. It’s the sort of grisly ancient history sight
that I really enjoy, and I’m very disappointed to have missed my chance. Oh well,
perhaps I’ll come back to Sicily one day.
Instead of doing any actual sight-seeing, we just wandered around Ortigia
again and shopped for souvenirs. Simon spent lots of money buying marzipan fruits
for his work colleagues. I hope they appreciate it! These fruits are a Sicilian
speciality, you see them everywhere and they are very realistically moulded such that
you could almost believe they are real until you bite into a ‘cherry’ and discover it’s
actually a lump of tooth-hurtingly sweet almond paste. Almonds and almond products
in general are a big thing in Sicily but we discovered that everything which claims to
be made from them is in fact made from a vast quantity of sugar with a very small
amount of almond added as an afterthought. Which is what you expect from marzipan
but was a little more disappointing from the granita and especially from the almond
milk.
For dinner we went to a cute little restaurant called La Gazza Ladra which
means ‘The Thieving Magpie’ (Philip Pullman fans will recognize the word ‘Gazza’
from the ‘Cittagazze’ or ‘City of Magpies’ which appears in ‘The Subtle Knife’. Note
that it’s pronounced ‘gatsa’ and has absolutely nothing to do with any Geordie
footballers you might think of). The antipasti were very good, the pasta was nice if
not desperately exciting, and the chocolate tart for pudding was fantastic.
Day 9 - Sunday
Today we moved on from Siracusa to Giardini Naxos, a beach resort up the
coast on the other side of Catania. The plan is that this will be our base for exploring
Mt Etna and Taormina, a swanky resort which we were too cheap to stay in ourselves.
But first we visited Pantalica, a gorge near a town called Sortino where there
are loads of prehistoric tombs cut into the rock. Getting there should have taken about
half an hour from Siracusa, if the Sat Nav was to be believed. It actually took an hour,
as the Sat Nav thought it would be entertaining to send us on a ridiculously twisty and
steep mountain road and the road layout and signage were the usual Sicilian blend of
whimsicality and sheer insanity. The highlight of this particular trip was the junction
where all directions were signposted to Sortino. Eventually we made it there and had
the fun of navigating its one-way system. As in all Sicilian towns, they like to send
you down the narrowest streets and cunningly don’t put any signs at crucial points. In
this instance Simon had to reverse into a blind junction after he’d realized we’d gone
the wrong way. He’s learning how to drive like an Italian at last. Fortunately once
you’re on the main route going southwards out of the town it’s easy to find the gorge
as the road stops abruptly at the edge. On the other side you can see the road carrying
on - apparently there was supposed to be a bridge over the gorge, but in typical
Sicilian fashion they never bothered to build it. They did however tell the people who
make the maps for the Sat Nav that they had built it. This must make some people’s
journeys even more entertaining than ours.
The sky was ominously grey as we made our way down the footpath, and soon
we could hear rumbles of thunder. This was suitable for the dramatic atmosphere Pantalica really is the most spectacular yet spooky place. Extremely steep rocky walls
on either side, pockmarked everywhere by the tomb entrances, the rushing of the
unseen river far below. Each tomb is only just big enough for a couple of bodies and
maybe a few grave goods, and the design is extremely simple - just a square hole cut
into the cliff. There aren’t any fancy carvings or paintings or flying buttresses or
baroque ornamentation. But there are literally hundreds of tombs, some cut into the
most inaccessible-looking bits of rock, and the overall effect is very impressive, the
sort of rugged, primeval grandeur you expect from prehistoric sites. Apparently
further on there is the remains of a Byzantine village. I can’t imagine what it must
have been like to live in this place, surrounded by the remains of a culture which must
have been as distant and unknowable to the Byzantines as it is to us. More so, in fact,
as they hadn’t excavated all the graves, stuck labels on the bits of broken pottery and
put them in Siracusa Archaeological Museum.
We didn’t linger long, however, as the thunder soon grew closer and it started
to rain on us. A quick dash back to the car, back to Siracusa via a much more sensible
route, then we packed up all our stuff and headed off to Giardini Naxos. This proved
to be an easy drive along Autostrada 18 and we were there in no time. Simon was a
bit concerned about the quality of the flat as he had just booked the cheapest place in
the area without checking up on it a great deal, but it was actually fine. A little tucked
away and in a rather ugly apartment block, but much bigger than the last place, with a
proper oven and fridge, a separate bedroom and a balcony with a view of Mt Etna
(when it’s not obscured by cloud). It will do us nicely I reckon.
After unpacking our stuff we found the beach (which is only about 200 yards
away) and walked along it for a while, hoping to reach the centre of town. After
slogging along the rough sand for half an hour, passing loads of hotels but nothing
that looked like a town centre, we came to a short strip of restaurants and bars. As we
couldn’t be bothered to walk any further, we stopped at one of these and had a very
ordinary but quite cheap dinner. Quite a few of the places along this strip had menus
in Russian. This was unexpected - obviously there are enough Russians with money
to burn who want to holiday somewhere a bit warmer than Odessa to make it worth
Sicilian restaurateurs’ while figuring out how to type Cyrillic characters.
Day 10 - Monday
Today was our first full day in Giardini Naxos. Simon had a shower and
discovered that the hot water ran out after about 2 minutes, so most of his shower was
cold and he couldn’t shave, which was a great disappointment as his face is getting
rather bristly. In the morning it was bright and sunny and we could clearly see Mt
Etna from the balcony as we ate our breakfast, which was quite exciting. We even
thought about making an expedition up there, but decided against this on the basis that
we had been so lazy that it was now ten o’clock and we really needed to have got
going about three hours earlier to do it justice.
Instead we went to the local supermarket and bought loads of food including
some sarde (that’s sardines. I’m getting quite a whiz at this Italian lark) to have for
dinner. This wasn’t exactly the most thrilling way of spending the morning, but at
least we’re now well-stocked with food. Then we went into Giardini Naxos, which by
day turns out to be a not particularly attractive resort sprawled out over several
kilometres of beach front, bigger than either of us suspected. Our apartment block is
at the extreme Southern end, pretty much in the next town. Oh well, this is what you
get for booking without checking the location on the map. We learned this from the
map taped to the counter in the tourist information office. When we asked for a copy
to take away, the man gave us a poorly photocopied version on which the street names
were illegible. Simon asked him very carefully for better copy but he said they were
not currently available. Another English couple who had come in at the same time as
us shrugged and said they were after the same thing, and then left, discouraged.
Fortunately, Simon is not so easily dissuaded, and after a good five minutes of
pestering (“When will you have better copies? Where can we buy a better map? Is
there a shop near here?) the tourist information man eventually caved in and gave us a
good-quality map, as we had originally requested. I don’t know if it’s standard
Sicilian tourist board policy to lie to tourists and give them useless handouts instead
of something that might actually encourage them to see any sights, or this one guy has
just flipped out and gone maverick after one too many asinine enquiries from sunbaked English idiots. Either way it was infuriating.
After a quick walk along the lungomare (that means promenade) in the
sunshine and an argument about whether it was worth going to the ruins of the Greek
city of Giardini Naxos (oldest Greek settlement in Sicily, apparently, founded by
colonists from - you guessed it - Naxos) we dashed back to the car before the parking
meter expired and headed to Sicily’s top resort, Taormina. It’s perched high on a hill
above the harbour and apparently has fantastic views of the sea and Mt Etna.
Unfortunately we didn’t see any of these views because as soon as we got out of the
car it started raining and the vistas were obscured by thick clouds. Like true English
holiday makers we gamely ate our packed lunch on a bench huddled beneath our
umbrella, then went into a café for ludicrously overpriced coffee and chocolate
croissant while we ‘waited for the rain to stop’. This sadly proved fruitless as the rain
didn’t stop all afternoon. The town’s two indoor museums turned out to be closed on
Mondays and we couldn’t be bothered to go to the famous Greek theatre as damp feet
had dampened our spirits. On the plus side we did manage to find a free parking place
which was definitely a bonus as the guide book warns that parking in Taormina is as
overpriced as the coffee.
As the rain showed no signs of easing off, and in fact seemed to be developing
into a thunderstorm, I stayed in a shop, not even pretending to be vaguely interested in
buying anything, while Simon went to find the tourist information office to see if they
had a weather forecast. He returned a few minutes later to report that they didn’t have
a weather forecast, and had indeed reacted to his query as if they couldn’t possibly be
expected to provide anything like a weather forecast. I mean, what do they think this
is, an office to provide information for tourists or something? This experience at least
answers the questions raised by our experience in the Giardini Naxos earlier in the
day: clearly it is in fact the entrenched policy of the Sicilian tourist board not to give
out any information from their information offices if they can possibly help it.
Simon’s brand of firm persistence eventually got them to show him two weather
symbols, one for Monday and one for Tuesday. Both showed a thundercloud.
In the evening we returned to the flat, where we lazed about reading a 4-euro
copy of the Observer which Simon had picked up in Taormina, listened to the rain and
thunder outside, and then cooked our sardines and had a beer. Simon found out that
he’d accidentally turned the boiler off this morning as it is mysteriously controlled by
a random switch in the bathroom. The electrics in this flat are wired with the same
whimsicality and flagrant disregard for safety as is shown in the design of Sicilian
roads. At least we now have more hot water and Simon was able to shave.
As I write these words the entire apartment has just been plunged into sudden
darkness by a power cut. Whoops, the lights have just come on again. Perhaps this is
because of the thunderstorm which is still raging in the distance. Then again, perhaps
not.
Day 11 - Tuesday
Simon got up earlyish this morning, then woke me up with the announcement
that it was a lovely day so we should definitely go up Mt Etna. He had apparently
been labouring under the bizarre misapprehension that I was going to set an alarm so
that we could rise even earlier. As in my opinion one of the most important benefits of
being on holiday is two weeks without alarms, I have no idea where he got hold of
this strange idea. In any event we set off for the mighty Etna in the sunshine. Finding
the ‘Rifugio Sapienza’ proved to be surprisingly easy. From the name I had in mind a
remote Alpine outpost, in fact it turned out to be a big restaurant-cum-hotel-cum-giftshop and it was heaving with people. Nearby was the biggest coach park I’ve ever
seen and a number of smaller gift shops, all selling the same selection of tat ranging
from blocks of marzipan and jars of nuts in honey to the brilliantly tacky ashtrays
shaped like Etna where you stick your cig in the bottom and the smoke comes out of
the crater at the top. Several places displayed photographs showing how near they had
come to destruction in the eruption of 2001 - and one café had a wall of black twisted
lava just feet away. Running a tacky shop must be a great deal more exciting if you’re
in constant danger of being incinerated by an unstoppable flow of molten rock.
I really wanted to ride the cable car up the mountainside but unfortunately it
costs twenty seven euros per person and we were far too cheap for that (if you want a
minibus tour as well it costs 51 euros. What a rip-off!). So instead we set off up the
rubble-strewn slopes on foot. It was the strangest landscape I’ve ever seen - fields of
black ash, heaps of light stones full of bubbles like rocky Aero bars, huge craters
streaked with red rising up from the slopes. It was extraordinary to think that the two
craters we could see near the Rifugio hadn’t even been there ten years ago. I’m used
to thinking of landscapes as eternal, changing only over thousands of years - Etna was
a reminder that the forces of the earth can sometimes move very quickly! Lower down
there were a few straggly plants growing, but once we got above the level of the upper
cable car station there was nothing - a completely desolate scene, like the surface of
another planet. I could imagine them filming an episode of Star Trek or something
here - it looked like nothing on earth.
Unfortunately the weather closed in again and soon we were walking through
clouds. It would have been a white-out if the ground hadn’t been black. Realizing that
this is clearly not going to be our holiday for enjoying great views, we turned back
again and skidded down the scree (well okay I skidded, regularly turning my ankle or
falling on my arse. Simon walked down quite easily and gave me helpful pieces of
advice such as ‘Keep your balance.’ Ah thanks, Si, I hadn’t thought of that one!).
Back at the Rifugio we treated ourselves to a chocolate croissant and, feeling tired but
pleased with our exertions, headed for Giardini Naxos once more.
Day 12 – Wednesday
By far the worst day of the holiday. It rained heavily most of the day and the
tourist information couldn’t tell us about any all-weather attractions, no doubt because
Sicily isn’t really geared up for such eventualities. I bet the tourist info in Keswick
can help you find something to do if it rains. Simon and I had the sort of rows you
have on these occasions, around my suggestion that we go to a big shopping mall I’d
seen advertised called Etnapolis versus his idea that we go for a walk in the rain. I had
actually reached the point to trying to contact Air Malta to rearrange our flights to go
home two days early (I couldn’t get through) when we hit upon the resolution that
tomorrow we will get up early and make the long trip to Palermo and Monreale.
These are places with stuff I really wanted to see (particularly Monreale’s Norman
Duomo) and which is, more importantly, indoors.
Day 13 - Thursday
As planned yesterday, we got up early this morning. I even set an alarm, in
direct contravention of my holiday principles, but desperate times call for desperate
measures. The rain continued all night long, keeping us awake and making me worry
that the place would get flooded and we’d be stranded in our apartment block, or that
the roof would cave in and cover our bed with icy water. Fortunately neither of these
things happened although when we got up the rain was still coming down in biblical
fashion so we rapidly jumped into the car and drove off for the North-West coast.
Three hours’ drive later we arrived in Monreale where it was gorgeously hot
and sunny. It was fabulous, if a little disheartening to think that this will almost
certainly be the last warm day I experience until next May (or even later given the
vagaries of the English climate). Monreale was rammed and once we’d managed to
drive right past the designated Duomo car park it was the usual nightmare of one-way
streets, Italians double-parked along busy thoroughfares and the sat nav trying to send
us down a pedestrianized zone. Eventually we found a parking space outside a sweet
shop and found the Duomo on foot without difficulty. The duomo has an interesting
charging system. The cathedral itself is free but the cloisters cost 6 euros, the tower
costs one-fifty as does one of the side chapels and it’s 52 cents to have a wee (why 52
cents I don’t know. Luckily the guy minding the toilets isn’t that vigilant about
stopping you walking out without paying). Another eccentricity is that the cathedral
and cloisters (and the toilets) are open all day but that the tower and side chapel close
at 12.30, ie just when we arrived.
But this didn’t matter because we got to see the cathedral’s glorious interior.
On the outside it’s a hulking Norman lump of a place, ruggedly impressive but
certainly not delicately beautiful (although if you go round the back to look at the
apse there are some nicely patterned tiled bits). But on the inside… it’s nothing short
of jaw-dropping. Every surface is covered with mosaics, exuberant in style, ambitious
in scope and perfect in execution, with plenty of gold everywhere. It reminds me
strongly of Byzantine art, particularly the strange depictions of angels as nothing but
several sets of wings. The guide book tells me that the cathedral was built very
quickly in the late 12th century by King William II and that the mosaics were probably
completed within ten years by Byzantine craftsmen (yes! My art history instincts were
right! This doesn‘t happen very often so you‘ll excuse a quick gloat). It also says that
the picture of Christ behind the altar is 20m high - let me repeat that, twenty metres
(or about sixty feet in old money).
The floors and pillars are tiled in abstract patterns which look vaguely Arabic
while the walls are covered in hundreds of saints’ portraits and scenes from the bible.
It’s at times like this that I wish I knew all the more obscure mediaeval saints and
bible fables but I still manage to spot some old favourites - the Creation and Noah’s
ark are clearly visible, the Last Supper and the throwing of the money-changers from
the temple are harder to recognise, and many other tableaux left me baffled. The
whole thing is in extremely good condition (as ever you don’t know how much has
been restored but there are certainly no cracks or anything visible). It made me almost
jealous of the people of the middle ages who would have come from a very visually
monotonous life into this riot of colour and beauty. What must it have been like to see
this when you hadn’t been sated by MTV and Pixar? And to have seen the vivid
representations of the stories you‘ve never read but which you actually believed? My
jaded twenty-first century mind simply can’t grasp how this would have felt, just like
I can’t imagine the awe someone must feel seeing the sea for the first time if they’ve
spent their lifetime inland.
In contrast to the interior, the cloisters were quiet and serene, the sort of place
which clears your mind and just makes you want to sit down and drink in the
atmosphere. The pillars are again vaguely Arabic and have an excellent selection of
carvings on the capitals. 6 euros just for a stroll round a quadrangle seems a bit of a
rip-off, but I suppose it allows them to keep the main cathedral free of charge. In any
case I was extremely glad that we got to see this place on our trip after all, and would
unhesitatingly list it as a ‘must-see’ for Sicilian holidaymakers.
As the weather was still good we decided not to risk our lives and sanity
driving into Palermo to see its museums and instead headed for the hills. First we
detoured to the ruins of a Greek city called Selunto, which sadly proved to be closed
because of fire risk but was in a nice spot by the coast. It had a small museum which
was open, all the labels were in Italian so it was lost on us, but at least it was free.
There were four guys employed to sit around in the museum chatting, playing cards
and pointlessly issuing tickets which never got checked. I’ll leave you to make up on
your own mind on what this says about Sicilian employment policies and work ethics.
Simon was keen to walk in the Monte Madonie range so we went on to the
‘capital’ of that region, Castelbuono, in the hopes that its tourist information office
would provide us with a walking map and that we’d be able to have a quick snack at a
nearby café. Surprisingly, and in reversal of our general experience on this trip, the
people in the tourist information office were very helpful and gave us a detailed map
for free without having to be badgered at all. However cafes were not much in
evidence - we spent ages traipsing around looking for somewhere, getting hungrier
and grumpier all the time. The city seemed to have no discernible centre to it, just
endless side streets with an oddly high number of hairdressers. The only supermarket
we saw was closed between one and five. I guess it’s not much of a tourist destination
so the amenities reflect the needs of the inhabitants and it gives a glimpse of the ‘real
life’ of inland Sicily, but still, it was extremely annoying. When I am a tourist I want
everything laid out for my convenience, thanks very much. If authenticity means I
can’t find an afternoon snack when I’m starving hungry, then it can sod off so far as
I’m concerned. Castelbuono accordingly stands as my least favourite place in Sicily.
To be fair to Castelbuono, it did provide us with a large map of the town
which enabled us to navigate to a small café where we fell greedily on the slightly
stale pizzas and sandwiches. Just as we were leaving the proprietor brought out trays
of fresh, delicious-looking pizzas and arancine. It was turning into one of those days.
Much delayed by our long and frustrating search for nutrition, but armed
against future pangs of hunger by a large bag of crisps tucked into our rucksack, we at
last set off on our walk at about half-past five. It was warm but overcast, the views
across the hills and the sea were spectacular, and the exercise and fresh air was
invigorating after a day spent mostly in the car. Unfortunately either the map from
Castelbuono was inaccurate or Simon’s navigation skills were sadly lacking (must
have been the former), and instead of reaching the summit of our designated hill we
instead realized that a) we were trespassing all over someone’s olive farm; b) they had
an Alsatian. Admittedly the dog stayed quiet and didn’t try to bite us, but it gave us a
bit of a look which suggested we shouldn’t stay around for too long. Never mind, the
views were great and we got to see plenty of wildlife, if ants millipedes and dung
beetles count as wildlife. It was getting dark by the time we got back to the car,
slightly annoyed at having only a short trip but still glad that we got to see at least
some of the Monte Mardonie.
For dinner, our last meal out of the holiday, we drove into Cefalu, which is a
tourist resort on the North coast crammed into a gap between the sea and a big rock
called La Rocca, which means, um, ‘The Rock’. Unlike our experience of most
Sicilian towns, it was easy to drive into and park and the restaurants were open at
half-past seven when we arrived. There was a huge storm raging out at sea throughout
the evening, and the from the promenade you could watch the countless bolts of
lightning light up the sky, but it was so far away that no sound at all reached the town
so it was rather surreal.We ate at a restaurant called La Gabbiana which our trusty
guide book had recommended - Simon had the Palermitan specialty of pasta con le
sarde, which is pasta with fresh sardines, fennel, raisins and pine nuts. I was going to
have the fritto misto but when I saw the buffet of antipasti - literally dozens of dishes
of vegetables and fish, all looking delicious - I was swayed. Unfortunately the vision
is always better than the reality in these cases, and while the mushrooms with
Parmesan and the grilled peppers and courgettes were tasty, some of the other things
were less than appetising - such as rubbery octopus, hard salt fish or the vegetables
stuffed with unidentifiable substances. Everything was drenched in oil and the sight of
the puddle on my plate after I had finished was faintly nauseating. It didn’t help that I
had of course piled everything on top of each other so it all mingled together in
unplanned and unpalatable combinations.
Afterwards we strolled along the seafront to watch the lightning and I tried to
cleanse my palate with a lemon granita from a nearby gelateria. Simon had one too
and unfortunately they were so revoltingly sweet that we both chucked them in the bin
after a few spoonfuls - an undignified end to our experience of Sicilian cuisine.
Day 14 - Friday
The last day of the holiday and it’s not been particularly fun so far. It’s 12
noon and all we’ve done is to decide that the murkiness and intermittent rain makes it
not worth venturing up to Taormina to try to see the Greek Theatre. This has been the
biggest disappointment of the holiday. If things clear up later we might still make the
trip but this doesn’t seem very likely. Also, I am feeling crappy today - possibly that
huge plate of antipasti has disagreed with me. When you think about it it’s really not
very hygienic to have all that stuff sitting there uncovered for god knows how long I’d never go to a Chinese buffet or anything like that back home, but being on holiday
blinded me to basic food hygiene principles. Oh well. Perhaps it wasn’t the dinner,
perhaps I’m just exhausted and depressed at the prospect of heading back to work
next week. Either way I’m not feeling up to much even if the weather had been
perfect so I’m staying in and catching up with this diary.
Update: in the afternoon we decided to go for it and went to Taormina. The
weather was dubious but clear enough for us to see quite a bit from the Greek theatre,
although Mt Etna was hidden behind clouds. The theatre itself isn’t particularly
exciting, and was full of incongruous modern stage equipment and seating for
performances in the evening. We learned from a poster that Womad was coming to
Sicily, I guess it was kind of a shame that we hadn’t thought to check ahead for
performances and maybe get tickets. This is the sort of thing that you always think
you should have done too late to actually do it. Ah well, never mind. The views from
the theatre’s high rocky position across the town and the sea were fabulous. And we
managed to see the theatre at last after all, so we can end the holiday on a note of
triumph rather than defeat. We’ve seen nearly all the places we had on our original list
of ‘must-sees’ and a few more. Of course we haven’t managed to spend quite as much
time on the beach as we would have liked, and the weather especially made a
mockery of the Giardini apartment’s proximity to the beach. But hey, at least the rain
got us into the right groove for coming back home…
Post script – the parking at Gatwick was fine.