In Provence

A day ago: Standing at an old fashioned French railway siding by the station house, next to a mom, her daughters, and their suitcases, she has dark thick curly hair like maybe from French Algeria, the girls and mom modern, stylish, long hair sleek. Maybe they are headed to a connecting train, then again, maybe to the airport. Meanwhile our local commuter train is a little late. At least two sleek sure fast TGV trains flash by, as we wait.

On the train: Watching the sun on the mediterranean and the high white cliffs and the modern suburban world of contemporary France. Being disappointed with Aix en Provence when our train finally got there: yes lovely, boulevards with plane trees, wrought iron; fancy food stores, handsome waiters; but too many stores targeted at vacationers looking for fancy outfits and among the tourists, too many Americans looking for "authentic" souvenirs... Perhaps too much soap and lavender... Spent a bunch on tablecloths to replace our stained ones...

By contrast, Marseille was feisty and vibrant, every one much more focused on their own community of Algerians or Tunisians or fellow teenagers or their friend with whom they are getting a quick meal of steamed mussels on a break from their workday. A fun city to keep walking in. Fascinating souvenir shops with fake crickets and lotsa Provençal whatnots but even more fascinating stalls selling color-drenched baggy dresses and headscarves for the Muslim ladies...

Today hiked a trail, sentier, into glowing red and yellow ochre in the cliff sides next to the town, Rousillion. The eroded soft formations were beautiful. Somewhat like Bryce, but there were nightingales and cuckoos singing in the woods which had chestnuts, Sylvester pines, money plant flowers, french "acacia"trees which is a sweet smelling white legume ... Along the roads were light blue bearded iris planted along terrace wall tops and fields absolutely thick with red poppies, "cocoliquos" and some yellow asters and lots of wildflowers of all types.

Some of the roads taken from Bandol through Aubagne past Aix up into the Luberon massif had parallel lines of tall ancient plane trees. Later we went up a narrow nearly gorge like river valley... At the top was a stone house ruin like an igloo in the shape of a bread loaf called a br.....

Wandering in ancient Menerbes.... Menerbes had a very nice old fortress of pale pastel amber stone, well, all houses are the same tone al built with the local stone, and even high on a crag it had a well.... Most buildings are way restored but a few turrets remain to be claimed. The countryside below is being ploughed,a mix of olives and wine and row cros, right now so green and springy and the faraway tall white craggy massifs look very nice with green on, not stark but certainly very steep, particularly if you are a biker.

At LaVerande we had salad, duck confit, and a glass each of Gigondas. followed for Craig by a wine fom Menerbes, Cote de Luberon. What I liked most was the view, the colored water glasses which turn out to be old mustard glasses, and the gentleman next to us slipping tidbits to his dog under the table, what else, a tiny white French poodle.

Genoa

We are somewhere north of Genoa today on a train speeding north to the border with France. Yesterday's storm has cleared. We are watching the Italian Riviera shoreline on the left, and suburbs, mountains, palm trees and breaking up clouds, on the right. We are having focaccia that we bought in Genoa this morning, and some of the wine we bought from Giovanni back in Sicily, in water bottles....

Genoa was a total mystery to us as we had no guidebook. Last night we got off our ferry, at the cruise ship port, that's how big the thing was, and we were feeling dazed and confused, thinking we would have to find a taxi but we learned that we could get to the heart of Genoa by the subway, and then back again to our train station in the morning. From the subway costing a euro fifty or less than $2, we emerged in the grand Piazza Ferrari where the grand avenue, 20 September, sweeps down five dramatic blocks to the grand city gate archway. The buildings on each side of this wide avenue are four or five stories with baroque facades and the bottom story of each one is an ornate colonnade with grand mosaic design floors, along one side is the street and the other side is grand shop windows and grand hotels like the savoie. Our own 70 euro hotel, the Hotel Soana, is in its own ornate office building, up on the fifth floor and after you are buzzed in to the building you get up there in a very old cage type elevator with a little leather seat that says 'maximum 2 passengers'. The hotel has 12 small high ceilinged rooms with ornate moldings, very nice.

We had no idea that Genoa had such a nice and manageable center. In addition to the grand avenue part, there are many older parts with renaissance churches and palazzios overshadowing very narrow streets with many cafes, bakeries snd no visible tourists. There are several of the beautiful churches that in their facades alternate black and white horizontal stripes of stone as you might see in Florence. The food is very tasty, the region of Liguria is the home of pesto, and last night we had a swordfish carpaccio and totally delicious antipasti including focaccia like treats and puffy things you dipped in a creamy garlicky seafood concoction. This morning we enjoyed a lot of foamy cappuccinos here called "cappuccios" each costing a euro or $1.30 us and so much so absolutely much better than anything Starbucks ever concocted. In the U.S. a "cappuccino" is mostly flat warm milk but in Italy it's pure light yet creamy foam. So nice to eat with a dark chocolate filled flaky pastry. I have thought of titling this blog entry "Fitter and Fatter" because I can now zoom up f lights of stairs but my tummy is definitely plumper and rounder. Darn.

A few more blocks down the XX Settembre avenue is the old market building which is still functional. All sorts of tasty produce including spiny artichokes, huge purple and green asparagus, radicchio, etc is there as well as delis selling pastas, truffle concoctions, and bakeries and butchers and fishmongers.

Dreaming of Sicily

Today Craig and I are in a spacious 2 berth cabin watching gray skies out of our enormous window as the engines thrum taking us far from Sicily which was always clear and sunny for us. It's so restful in this quiet cabin, We have done so many things each day that it's hard to remember even two days ago.

Two mornings ago, (thursday, only our fifth morning in sicily) we woke up in Polizzi Generosa, in Cece's bed and breakfast in a huge antique bed overlooked by a painting of Christ himself spreading his arms in a catholic benediction, in rooms filled with antique cabinets filled with the family's silver, looking over a small garden wedged in between the tall medieval houses of Polizzi Generosa, the beautiful hill town that sits on a huge promontory over valleys that stretch far, far down to the mediterranean, barely glimpsed as the sun set. Our breakfast included excellent coffee with steamed milk and sweet cookies, we met her husband, another elderly guest, and the monk who lives upstairs who stopped by in his brown cassock. Soon we were in our car threading our way out the narrow streets and up and over the Madonies. In this part there are tall cliffs of limestone and long valleys covered with rippling wheat, as we dropped lower there were very old olives. I imagine there used to be tiny farms but now the beautiful landscape is made more lovey by the long sweep of each green field. Some of the fields and all of the radsides are covered in yellow wildflowers sprinkled here and there with purple, while some entire fields are sown with red clover I suppose to rest and rebuild the soil. The roads are very twisty, hard to see how the land folds so much when the fields stretch out like that. The roads slump so you have to keep your eyes open as the road may narrow just as the huge local bus comes around the curve.

As we dropped lower the towns had higher proportions of 20th century ugly apartments. We stopped at one town that sits under a huge crag which is under an even huger crag, the original Arabic name of the town is something like the raptors castle or eagles nest. Because in medieval times everyone was competing for sicily -- European Norman knights who held on the longest, Saracens who were either Turks or pirate types from the south Mediterranean, and of course the Arabs who had ben temporarily in control -- locals built towns around defensible castles very high up. We climbed up above the current town to the original medieval town in ruins. Beautiful mysterious and what a view!

The next town Cerda seemed totally modern at first view. We stopped to gas up at the local station: two pumps and a tiny kiosk along the street. The local owner watched our illegally parked car while we went to find trattoria Nasca, where the proprietor, a brisk lady, told us she might be open in an hour. So we stashed our car in a shady 1 hour zone, under the eagle eyes of mr. Sneaky, a retiree whose job now is to inform the traffic cops if you park too long. Then we had to shift to the sunny spot. The way one hour parking works is,your car has a little paper dial by the rear view mirror, you turn it to show what time you park.

I think Craig wrote about our wonderful artichoke meal. First we had seven artichoke dishes, then we asked for coffee then she laughed in amazement, oh no that was just the antipasti you still need to eat the artichoke pasta primi and the secondi of shrimp and smoked fish and the dessert and THEN you can ask for coffee. Here, have some more of the delicious jug red wine.

After lunch we drove down to the (very welcome) fast toll road, whisked over east to Cefalu, a very very touristy resorty medieval beach town with a lovely set of byzantine mosaics in the cathedral and a lot of tourists on the beach and in the bars. Wow, first overweight people we have seen in at least 4 days, seeing as how in the Sicilian hill towns you get constant vigorous exercise just walking the stairs in your house, the stairs that are your street, and the stairs into church. And these overweight people were in bikinis, not in decorous black.

Finally we went through afternoon nightmarish Sicilian traffic to find the EuropCar dealer in Palermo (one story down inside the train station) and finally connect car and dealer and then take a local train three stops down into old town Palermo and then find the Hotel Orientale.

Hotel Orientale. Wow. Imagine you are on a grimy street with immigrant restaurants (Indian, african) on the bottom floors of medieval palaces and belle époque mansions. Then you open a tiny door cut in the huge portal doors of a genuine palace with a central courtyard, only it is as rundown as can be, African language pop music wailing loudly from one of forty windows overlooking the core, which is packed with cars and scooters; laundry hangs; big chunks are missing from most of the some walls and electric and water conduits connect everything; then you ascend the grand staircase of polished stone on the far side up two landings, then another set of fancy but grimy doors. Opening them up you are in the most charming little spotless family run hotel, the ceilings are a mile high with tasteful painted moulding designs, the rooms have lovely fixtures and lights. Our room has doors opening on to a narrow balcony shared with three others overlooking a grimy busy little alley with street stalls and the disintegration of the walls is even more apparent , but step back inside and you are again in stylish paradise. That's the Hotel Orientale, and only 40 euros, breakfast included. Breakfast is in the front sitting room, the one with the balcony that Mussolini stood on to talk to, I guess, his adoring crowds back in the 1930s

Spleens and Spooks

We are now on La Suprema, a giant luxury ferry/cruise ship that is taking us on a 20 hour ride from Palermo to Genoa. It is gigantic and has everything you would expect on a cruise liner, but also is carrying cars, trucks and buses. Amy and I are having a glass of Sicilian "Grillo" white wine and are watching Palermo recede in the distance, a full moon overhead.

Today we walked all over Palermo, about 11 hours on our feet, and saw much of this wild and crazy city.

Of course we saw the architectural highlights, but the best part for me was the street food, which Palermo is famous for. We were walking through one of the markets and there was this man who had a big wicker basket with a towel on top. He dipped his hand in the basket, under the towel, and brought out a handful of strange looking offal. Apparently, these are the parts of the cow that the butchers don't want; stomach, intestines, and other savory parts. He then sprinkled on some salty, spicy stuff on top and handed it to me on a napkin. Delicious! Definitely not for everyone (including my darling Amy), but for those who like to eat local, bizarre food...fantastic! The parts had a great flavor of fat, salt and beefy goodness.

At another stall, not too far away, another man was serving the quintessential Palermo street food. This is thinly sliced beef spleen, cooked in lard and then placed in a bun. Wow, this was really tasty, too. Amy bravely took one bite, but generously let me have the rest of it.

After all this savory, salty, beefy food, it was time for gelato. Palermo is famous throughout Italy for its gelato. I had a delicious combination of peach (amazing true peach flavor) and pistachio, which had big chunks of pistachio nuts in it. Amy had a rich, dark chocolate (about as rich and dark as is possible) and tiramisu. The Gelato Gods were looking down on us with great favor today. In fact, on this trip through Campagna and Sicily, we've had gelato once or twice a day.

We visited several churches today with incredible mosaics, the best being Monreale. These mosaics were done in the 11th Century by Greek artists and are some of the best in the world. It is a bit overwhelming, as literally every square inch of the interior of the church is covered with mosaics. The mosaics tell the stories of e bible, like Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, etc. The colors are incredibly vibrant and it's hard to believe these are mosaics and not paintings.

We went to the church of Monreale, famous for its mosaics, created by Byzantine artists in the 11th Century. The entire interior of the church is covered in mosaics and it can be a bit overwhelming. They are mostly stories from the Bible...Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, etc. They are all so vibrant and look almost new.

We also saw the mosaics of the palatine Capella in the enormous grand old Norman castle which is now the government building. It was more intimate and the quality of artistry amazing. Before our trip we read a historical novel, A Ruby In Her Navel, about a young norman in Palermo in 1150, who watches the Greek artists that the king has specially imported, because of their far superior craftsmanship, create these marvelous designs that glow and shed light.

Another highlight was the cloister in Monreale. A huge courtyard surrounded by a covered colonnade on all four sides, where each support was a pair of white sandstone columns inset with gold and silver and jewel toned mosaics, twisting around the sides each in different patterns, very arabic styling , then each column topped with fanciful carvings in the sandstone, bas reliefs of animals, birds, mythical creatures, humans in everyday pursuits, humans depicting legends, no two alike. And in one corner a moorish fountain also surrounded in columns, upholding moorish style arches.

But the really weird thing to visit here is the Capuccine monastery, where there are catacombs. Craig loved it... Amy not so much. Its full of lifelike--- dead people.

For hundreds of years (from the 1500s to the 1800s), the monks of the monastery, along with some of the higher class citizens of Palermo, would end up in a niche along the walls. They would be hung up here (after they were dead!), dressed in their finest robes or suits. Here they are still, staring out at you in a rather ghoulish way. Some bodies have been preserved better then others and you can still see bits of skin and hair. One little girl, who died in 1920, was preserved so well in an experiment by a doctor, that she really looks like she's asleep, complete with her curly blonde hair and ribbon. The story goes that her twin sister still visits her here almost everyday.

A deal in Palermo is the bus system. For 3.50 euros you get unlimited transfers for 24 hours. So even though we walked lots, we also had our trips around town, to Monreale, back, and then over to the Stazione Maritima, the ferry piers near the newer (1800s) downtown, all with ease. No taxis.

We had a final taste of Sicilian food and wine, Cerasuolo, near the piers, then got on this grand ship with its escalators, elevators and dog pooperia decks.

After a night in Genoa, it's off to see our dear friends Catherine and Jean Marie Peyraud, who live in Bandol, France. They and their family are the owners of the famed Domaine Tempier winery in the little village of Le Castellet.

Artichoke Heaven

Before we came to Sicily we saw a program on the Travel Channel, called Bizarre Foods. The host came to a little town in the Madonie Mountains, called Cerda, to an artichoke festival. He went to a restaurant where they specialize in artichokes. Today we searched out this town and this restaurant and it didn't disappoint.

The Nasca restaurant indeed specializes in artichokes. We were first served the antipasti, which consisted of seven different dishes, all on their own plates. First came out a plate of olives and a plate of marinated artichoke hearts. These weren't the bitter, nasty artichoke hearts we are used to in jars, but had a sweet flavor. Next came out a frittata of artichoke, some boiled artichokes, an artichoke spread on toast, lightly fried artichoke hearts and last, but not least, whole artichokes, cut in quarters and roasted directly on hot coals. These last two were unreal and I would really like to learn how to cook them like this. I really thought this was the whole meal and asked the waitress for coffee and she just laughed and told me this was just the beginning. Next was a penne pasta with artichoke hearts, fava beans and a creamy ricotta cheese. Oh my!! Then came our fish dish, a giant prawn with some smoked fish and not an artichoke in sight. Maybe they ran out. For dessert we had a delicious cannoli, crunchy and creamy! All this, including wine, water and espresso, for 19 euros!

Tonight we are in Palermo. It's a gritty, dirty busy city, not for the faint of heart. Driving in and finding the Eurocar office was horrible, but thanks to Amy we somehow made it. Our hotel is in an old palace and I think the last time it was painted was in the 18th Century. Supposedly, Musselini stayed here. The air con doesn't work well and it's not in the best area of town. But what do you expect for 40 euros?

Tomorrow, Saturday, we will visit the city before getting on our 20 hour ferry ride to Genoa. Hopefully there we will have wifi and we can post our blogs.

Fiestas, Hill Towns, and a Big Volcano

It's Thursday night and we are up in the Madonie Mountains in the amazing hill top village of Polizzi Generosa. This, like other hilltop towns in Sicily, is plopped right on top of a giant rock and must have been a great place to fight off the invading hordes of Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Spaniards or whoever else decided to invade Sicily. It didn't work all that well, as each of these groups over the centuries conquered Sicily. But the result is that this and other towns are drop dead gorgeous. Polizzi is on a huge promontory withe 360 degree views of the surrounding mountains. Being spring, the fields all over this part of Sicily are vibrant green and there are wildflowers everywhere. Sheep and cows are all over the place, munching on the tasty, green grass.

Not the easiest places to drive, however. We left Siracusa Wednesday morning in a wonderful rented car called a Fiat 500. This is a recent reissue of the famous Italian car that had been popular here for decades. It's the Italian version of the Volkswagen Bug. With Amy as my navigator, Michelin map in hand, we set off to explore the interior of Sicily. Hilltop towns like Palazollo Acreide, Caltagirone, Piazza Armeniere, Ariba and now Polizzi. Thank goodness we have such a tiny car (which amazingly doesn't feel all that small when you're in it) because the streets are so narrow that we have squeezed through some streets with an inch to spare.

For lunch we went to the town of Ariba, to the very top of tow to a restaurant with a great view. Kudos to this car for getting us up there (and to Amy for navigating us through the bewildering streets). Once on top of the town we had this incredible view of Mt. Etna. This is Sicily's Mt. Fuji, a 11,000 foot high beautiful volcano. It was about 50 miles away, but still took up much of the landscape. It has been erupting all year and there was a huge plume of smoke blowing out its top. Lucky for us we were up wind. What a great place to watch this as we had a delicious lunch of antipasti (grilled eggplant, roasted peppers, salami, pecorino cheese, grilled mushrooms) and a pasta with a ragu sauce.

We have met some very nice locals here. Yesterday we came into the town of Piazza Armeniere, looking for a BandB called Umberto 33. We were in town to see a procession where they carry a 1000 year old painting of Madonna and child around town. We parked in the tiny town square and a man came over to tell us that we shouldn't leave our car there as this is where the procession wes coming in a couple of hours and the police would tow us. He handed us the card and he happened to be the owner of the BandB we were looking for! After we got settled he invited us to his enoteca, or wine tasting shop, to try the local wine. His name was Giovanni, and like most other folks in this town, was light skinned and blue eyed, the result of the Norman invasion in the 10th Century. We had a great time with him, tasting through some delicious local wines like Nero d'Avola, Cerasuolo da vittoria and Grillo. After a quick dinner of pizza with cheese, potatoes and mushrooms, the procession came through with teenagers carrying the painting on a giant platform (boys in front, girls in back) and the town folk following along with a brass band. They went through the whole town, stopping at various churches on the way, bells ringing everywhere. Eventually they made it way to the top of the town, to the Duomo, where the Padre blessed the painting, the teenagers, the brass band and whoever else was in the vicinity.

In the morning, Giovanni served us a delicious breakfast of rich, dark coffee and these amazing fried dough things stuffed with sweet, creamy ricotta. He also had us try this pistachio spread on our toast. It was sweet and creamy and oh so good! We wanted to get an early start, but ended up talking for an hour with Giovanni about Sicily, California, Hawaii, ukuleles, you name it. He spoke no English, but with some French, Spanish and our tiny bit of Italian, we had no problem communicating.

This evening, here in Polizzi Generosa, we have again lucked out. These towns are hard enough to drive around in when there is nothing going on, but as we came into town there were market stalls, kiddie fun rides, and lots of people. We got what seemed to be the last parking place in town and walked down the street to a little square that had an information office. The man in the information office told us that this was their big day for a procession and that the procession would be coming by in less the an hour!! After a major search, he was able to find us the last room in town. Then here came the procession. Two men with huge drums were followed by about 20 men carrying what was the most tormented looking Christ on the cross I've ever seen, followed by men and women in groups of colored velvet shoulder capes (from the different parishes, I would guess), all looking very somber and pious. The men were in dark beautifully cut immaculate suits the women in blacks and grays. They were followed by a brass band playing what sounded like a John Phillip Souza march with a mafioso flavor. Then the other townsfolk brought up the rear. At times the crowd bunched up as the procession slowed and filled entire piazzas and then some, They also marched through the whole town and eventually at 10:30 pm, fireworks were set off to end the celebration.

Friday we are off to Palermo, into the big city. Don't know when we will be able to post our blogs, as these places we are staying in have no wifi, but hopefully we will post soon.

Any Color is Okay, As Long As It's Black

Tonight we are in the wonderful town of Polizzi Generosa, up in the madonie muntains of north Sicily, being treated to our third major festa of the trip. And this time it's absolutely Sicilian style: processions of serious faced Sicilians in black, men and women, absolutely silent and serious, pious expressions, carrying tapers as big as they are, through stone streets in a stone town on a stone promontory of a stone mountain range. Dramatic beautiful scenery, dramatic beautiful people.

The fireworks have started exploding and it's time to write about the last two rich full days. In the 36 hours since we left Siracusa in our rented car, we have crossed the Sicilian nation from south to north. We have been in Greek religious ruins on high olive groves, in roman hunting lodge ruins with spectacular mosaics of every wild animal and wild human behavior, in a Norman town where everyone is strongly built and fair haired and blue eyed like they just got back from the Crusades, and in a ceramic artists paradise where painters rave about cobalt blue and manganese green.

We have been staying or eating in five more hill towns in the two days: palazollo acreide, caltagirone, piazza Armerina, morgantina, aripa, and Polizzi Generosa.

I would like to write about each stop in detail, as so much happened, so I can remember the trich details

Wednesday morning (yesterday) in Siracusa,where the air was warm, we took an early morning stroll past the yachts and through the old stone town with its sophisticated stores and restaurants. Then in our rented Fiat, we were out into the warm summery countryside climbing into limestone mountains. In less than an hour we were in the hill city, Palazollo Acreide, drinking cappuccinos next to the town's older men and Amy walked up 100 steps to the cathedral, where pigeons were cooing in the baroque interior. The town also has a tiny museum a collection of Sicilian folk art: marionettes and nativity figures carved 150 years ago, baseboards of Sicilian carts carved with mythology, old ceramics in pale green Arabic styles. Better still, outside town is the acreon, a small ruined greek city, with almost no one there! We explored the grassy Greek theater, the remains of temples to Artemis, the huge quarries that, long after the Greeks gave way to the Romans, were turned by early Christians into catacombs and safe living spaces in the decades of war that followed. The area is rural, warm, green, with vistas of miles towards the seas.

From there we started climbing on rural curvy roads up and up. In another hour we went to the very top of a dramatic baroque style hill city, Caltagirone, where the Arabs started a ceramics tradition that still thrives today with beautiful platters, madonnas, pitchers and bowls. We ate antipasti and spaghetti Norma, an eggplant sauce. In this town there's a stairway 500 stairs long, and this time of year it's covered in plants that from a distance make it look like its covered in flowering vines. On each side are about a hundred ceramics shops, each with slightly different styles, they sit and paint the slips on the ceramics as they wait fr customers to stop by. And the results are fantastic.

After Caltagirone we got to one of Sicily's fine freeways that whisked us high up the central part, olive groves and Hawthorne trees and cedars. Here in the middle of suburbs of Piazza Armerina, is a roman emperor's hunting palace/lodge that was buried in mud a thousand years ago. It is fill of beautiful Mosaics of great detail and color, on every floor and the walls were once beautifully frescoed. The place is enormous, takes at least an hour to wind through it all on the scaffoldings they have created to take you over every drawing.

Finally we ended the day in the ancient medieval center of Piazza Armerina, high Norman citadel town, and this day was the feast of Santa Maria Della Vittoria, our lady of victory. In between hot pizza topped with cheeses boiled potato slides and fresh herbs, and wine tastings offered at the wine store of our b&b owner Giovanni, we joined the procession with the local high school band and a group of teens in white carrying a portrait of virgin and child on one side, and french/norman crusader on the other. The crowd sang hymns, said a lot of hail Mary's and went all around up and down the steep mountain up to the cathedral.

Thursday morning.... This morning.... We spent an hour at breakfast with Giovanni eating hot fried yeasty bread filled with thick sweet ricotta and a local pistachio butter on bread and a jam they make of Mexican nopal cactus, very popular to grow here. We drove just a few miles east of the roman villa and now we were hiking through a huge wealthy Greek city where they found hoards of silver platters with gilded designs, statues of Demeter and persephone because they think the local lake was the entrance to hades underworld. Also on the east horizon, mt Etna was snow covered and billowing clouds of smoke and steam. Quite a sight!

We spent the rest of the afternoon climbing passes into the very green madonie mountains, covered with green wheat fields, sheep pastures, and horse and cow pastures. The mountains are huge rocks and the hilltowns crown the highest points of the highest crags.

Wc drove and drove, pausing when local shepherds had to coax 50 sheep across the narrow roads, it got greener and greener and the wildflowers more and more fabulous. We had lunch way high in the mountaintop town of aripa on the deck of a restauran appropriately called the bel vedere, beautiful view --because it was perched way up on a cliff dropping to a huge turquoise lake below mt Etna, with a tall medieval fortress in the foreground. Amazing! We ate antipasti and spaghetti with ragu and rose wine.

Now we are in Polizzi. We had no reservations and did not even know there was going to be a festa here. Because everyone wanted to watch or take part in the procession, and because there are only 3 places to stay, and two were full and one had only one room left, it was touch and go to find out if we could be here or nit, but some very kind people took many extra steps to helps track down some hosts and we are now the guests of CeCe, in palatial accommodationsy,with antiques, having been out at the towns only formal restaurant, now listening to the fireworks boom. Two more days in Sicily! Tomorrow down towards Palermo, then we'll see.

Bella Siracusa

Did we forget to post about Syracuse?!!!

We are about to disembark in Genoa and left Siracusa four days ago but it was such a fabulous little city. The first glance is its a little run down, and that's probably because many Sicilians have not much money, live in cramped apartments and don't have a lot of money to refurbish the lovely buildings they have inherited from the past, with wrought iron railings, crumbling stone lintels and rotting giant doors. It's not like you can go to Home Depot for these kinds of repairs! So only rich people or entrepreneurs can make an old palace look new.

Our hotel for our two stays in sicily was the Posta, called that because it is on post office square, the very top of the island of Ortygia which is the heart of Siracusa for a tourist. Within its few avenues wide enough for one large car plus sidewalk space, its many tiny alleys shadowed by overhanging balconies, and its seaside promenades where the stone walls drop ten feet or more to the old rock ruins below, it's enchanting. In the heart is the duomo, a huge church built entirely within the former Sanctuary of Athena, its walls containing the huge columns carved by the Greeks rising 25 feet up but within it, a medieval then baroque roofed cathedral. In front of the Duomo which is made of veryblight brown sandstone or is it aged colcanic tufa, is a classic huge Italian piazza, acres of smooth pavement, open spaces where kids play what I know as "indoor soccer" without goals, restauranteurs place tables and awnings, and people love to stroll about.

The best part of a Sicilian evening, in a town not overrun by sun-seeking tourists like of example Cefalu, is the passagiata: an aimless but purposeful flow of happy people from early twilight until full dark, checking each other out, deciding where to stop for a drink, a beer or a coffee or a meal, and chatting endlessly. The women dress casually but nicely, maybe with gold shiny high top high heeled "sports shoes" and very skinny legged jeans.

Siracusa is full of these people in the evening. The first night we arrived, late, by train, we went out to search for food. From our hotel we went past a floodlit Greek ruin and into the diagonal street that plunges into the heart of Ortygia which is lined with fashionable stores with nattily dressed mannikins in their windows. It was eleven, we were looking for eats and didnt know where to go, later we realized there are thousands of great places in Ortygia. But we went to a small trattoria in Piazza Posta, that was finishing serving a large happy family of twelve. We ordered antipasti, then spaghetti cooked with the black ink of cuttlefish. Delicious!!!

The next day early morning we took off by cheap local bus for Modica, which we already wrote of, for the feast of San Giorgio. We feel you can't go wrong using Siracusa as a base if you have to. But we think our choice of Modica was the best : Ragusa seems too large and too praised (we never got there) and Noto, which everyone seems to love, to us after Modica seemed too flat and too sterile in its perfection and way too tourist oriented. In contrast Modica seemed its own town and Ortygia, and the other less fancy parts of Siracusa, did too.

Our return to Siracusa was wonderful. The hotel Posta is a former fascist mansion built in the late 1800s, not that perfectly restored, wonderful personnel, and a bit cheaper because it is on the border of Ortygia, an "island" linked by three different bridges to Siracusa. We liked that: it was a quick walk to the train station, the adjacent bus "station" which is really an open air bus stop for two different companies, and to EuropCar car rental. Also it was not far at all, past a few blocks of shabby tall apartment complexes, to the old Greek ruins of an old theater, a gladiator complex and big quarry/caves. Nor also to the quirky but really pretty great archaeological museum which has lots of "stuff" from 5000 years ago on but also some amazing classic Greek sculpture, pots and decorations. Loved the excellent parts of this.

We had some really nice meals in Ortygia, think we wrote about one restaurant run by the twin of David Tachera, and also we really enjoyed the traditional puppet show. They used music between acts that sounded like it was taken from lord of the rings but the action, costuming and drama of the marionettes, which is old medieval plays about Charlemagne's knights and magical figures from china and the Arab world, was right on.

Our advice for eating in Ortygia would probably be to avoid the places right on the water with high turnover, or too near the Duomo, instead roam the smaller alleys and check menus since they all look really great and we were not disappointed for any of the four meals we ate there but we liked the more touristy spots, the least. Also we enjoyed the early morning fish markets where we first got to hear the bizarre fishmongers' calls, advertising in a long singsong what they've got what it's gonna cost ya and why you should get it right then and there. Hearing it is the equivalent of watching peacocks strut their stuff. Very macho and showy. Also there are some bizarre, costly foods: yellow sea urchin eggs scooped out of the black spiny shells by the eyedropper sized scoop spoons, sold in tiny plastic cups for ten euros.

Seeing double in siracusa

Today's luncheon came with a generous pour for both of us, of the house white a Sicilian sauvignon blanc, so maybe we are not surprised that tony tossa, the restaurateur of il tempio di Atena , the temple of Athena, seemed so much like a twin of one of our favorite californians, kawika tachera. Kindly joking and persuading with suggestions. Same grin and laughter. Same goatee and close shaved hair. Very handsome. As far as we know, there is no one with Hawaiian blood or even portagee blood in Sicily, but the whole place is such a genetic mishmash of phoenician Greek roman Arabic Spanish French and whatever, who knows. And I have seen a lot of faces in south italy who look just like folks in my office in novato. So are we seeing double, or seeing doubles? Anyway it's a pleasure to be reminded of folks we care for.
So tony/kawika suggested we start with fresh seafood mixed with warm garlicky potatoes cooked in wine and then more mixed seafood cooked in linguine. Since we had seen all the seafood the shellfish anyway quite alive squirting very lively in the market down in our neighborhood hours before, with the merchants calling out songs about them , we knew they were very fresh and he was right on in the preparation. Best meal we've had yet. How many times are we going to say that to ourselves here?
Anyways Syracuse definitely has roots that are quite deep, and mixed... this morning we walked around in a theater the Greeks built that holds thousands and inside caves the pre-Greeks carved out thousands of years before the Greeks arrived, then the Christians used them for burial chambers. And we saw beautiful Greek statues and a lovely cathedral built right inside the temple of Athena, lined with thick grooved Greek Doric and Corinthian columns. Later as we walked along the outer edge of the island of ortygia, siracusa's core, we looked down on the rocks jumbled in the ocean and realized they were sculpted or cut.... They were probably the Greek Barbour defenses against the romans. Or the Arabs against the Spanish. Or whatever.

Bonsai in Sicily

Bonsai in Sicilia

Today we have come to the beautiful hill town of Modica. We are here for their patron saint's day, the Festa di San Giorgio. Tonight, the statue of San Giorgio, riding on his horse, will be brought out of the church and paraded around town. Lots of fireworks will accompany San Giorgio on his ride around town.

We arrived here after a 2+ hour bus ride from Siracusa. The first thing I saw was a poster for a bonsai show, from the Bonsai Club of Messina, Modica Chapter. After checking into our hotel, we found the show on the main street. There were really nice bonsai, many yamadori (collected trees from the wild) including olives, oaks, rosemary and carob. They had amazing trunks, with lots of deadwood. I asked them if they knew a bonsai master I have learned from, Marco Invernizzi, and indeed they knew him.

For lunch today we were recommended to go to a nearby place that had a 19€ many course meal. Trattoria A pulia ro vino. It was full up, and ordering a la carte was not allowed but who'd want to?

the antipasti course had eleven items: a very thin sliced grilled eggplant, marinated lightly in balsamic, with italian parsley; a fried ball of rice with cheese and peas and tomatoes inside; a very thin savory lasagna, 3 layers separated by light cheese, and the very top layer was thin light baked wheat; a local very soft delicate cheese that felt like it melted into your mouth like a whipped cream cheese but of course much better; a perfect dry light thin well cured salame; whole wheat bread toast with melted butter and minced fresh parsey; triangular white bread very lightly fried not oily at all; a tender omelette spread with greens and cheese, rolled up, sliced into thin rounds; boiled brown eggs; and green olives.

This was followed by primi and there were 3 of these: First a thick soup with thick, rope-like pasta called lolli, and big, flat brown broad beans, in a thick broth. This was followed by two pastas, a ravioli filled with cheese in a tangy tomato sauce, and a shell like twisted pasta with a tomato sauce with tiny pieces of savory pork sausage.

Then the main secondi course, there were two of these, pork and pork sausage in a tomato sauce, and boiled beef, with a "contorno", a side of yummy scalloped potatoes with sweet onions and lots of very good olive oil.

There were two desserts also, a traditional tender gelatinous thing made of wheat that tasted fragrant, so hard to describe, very subtle, and much better than it looked ; and crispy cannoli with a creamy ricotta middle and chocolate bits.

This was all washed down with a local red house wine and finished off with a thick,sweet espresso.

A great meal!

Time for a nap and the off to the festival!...........

.......okay, we're back from the big procession. We've perched ourselves on the roof terrace of our nice hotel, Le Magnolie (at only 70€, a very nice find), with a lovely bottle of Cerasuolo di Vittoria (a wine from here in Modica, a delicious, fruity, very easy down the throat wine), a plate of the local cheese, some dry salami and some bread. We were going to go out to dinner, but why bother? We have a view of the whole town and fireworks are going on above the town as San Giorgio is making his way around town, eventually going back to his church, when there will be more fireworks.

It all started this afternoon when the statue of San Giorgio, Modica's patron saint, was carried out of the church by many strong men. There were hundreds of locals (we were two of the very few tourists attending) watching when there were loud booms and giant fountains of blue, red and yellow confetti were blown into the air. San Giorgio, saint george, is on horseback waving a glittering sword, and his horse is trampling a green dragon which looks very uncomfortable with a spear sticking in its gullet. Since he is riding horseback, he has to move fast! The men carrying San Giorgio were followed by a marching band and they, along with the huge crowd that included us, literally ran up the streets into the upper town. They wear red t shirts (which on the front advertise the "Thousand and One Nights Bar" and on the back is a picture of S. Giorgio) and flow upstream like a red river. The marching band (mostly high school aged kids, both boys and girls) kept playing the same song, over and over, the song of San Giorgio. We marched through the streets, where people on their balconies would shower San Giorgio with even more confetti. Eventually, we kind of ran out of steam and let San Giorgio and his followers go on their merry way. We were by this time way up in the high reaches of the upper town, but made it back down for a nice gelato of the local chocolate and amaretto.

Back at our hotel, we discovered that they have a wine bar (in an actual cave, carved in e cliff behind us) and the hotel's concierge, Giuliana, brought the wine ( red Cerasuolo di Vittoria, winery is Cantina Avide, 2006) in beautiful glasses up to the terrace, with the cheese and salami, so who needs dinner? We are now looking out over the whole, beautiful town of Modica, waiting for San Giorgio to come back to his church, where there will be a huge fireworks display. Hopefully, we won't have run out of wine by then.

We can't rave enough about this hotel. It is an old house on one of the tiny walking streets/stairways off the main "road"', Umberto I (which used to be the creek until 1902).... The room has vaulted ceilings, the bathroom is huge and has very stylish Italian ceramic fixtures, the bed is a perfect firm King, the sheets are so smooth. The upstairs terrace has gentle sconce lighting low down so you can see each other and still see the glories of the town on all sides. We also love Modica, with it's hundreds of curvy streets, arches, gateways, balconies, wrought iron, gargoyles. Everything is light colored sandstone, and here and there the old stone will have weathered so much that it looks like ropy coral while the carvings on the other side of the doorway are still as sharp as if they were sculpted last week. Many buildings must be empty, with the doorways rotting, others are restored. Our side of the river canyon was for ordinary folks, the far side has magnificent palaces and churches.