Catania - Last day in Sicily

On Thursday the 24th we wake and pack our bags once again. We're leaving the Villa Angela and the stupendous view of Etna

for nearby - ap. 40 mins. - Catania, birthplace of Giovanna, Oswaldo's mother. Soon we're zipping down the highway in the sun, sparkling turqouise sea on left, almost cloudless vulcano on right, until we reach the busy city and realize that in spite of the GPS this is where you drive with your guts - there seem to be few rules.  But we reach the Grand Hotel Excelsior and manage to park right in front. We leave Victor working with Oswaldo's computer in our room, which is ready, his is not, and go explore the town. On a busy street corner we stop for Granita de Latte de Mandorla (delicious but very sweet) and orange juice.

We take a look at the lush green Villa Bellini park across the road, but continue down Via Etnea in search of Via Vasta, named after Giovanna's family. Before we get there I spot a fabulous street market that sells absolutely everything and stretches over a warren of small streets. Trailing a patient Oswaldo behind me I dash from stall to stall, but then we're out of it and find the street, we've been looking for

On we go towards the Piazza Duomo, stopping for a(nother) light lunch of Caprese Salad and Bruschetta, and then we see the famous Liotru, the elephant fountain, which is the symbol of Catania

Across the wide square lies the Cathedral (closed for lunch...) dedicated to Saint Agatha, to whom unspeakable things were done,

and, at the further end the Fontana dell'Amenano straddles  the River Amenano, which once ran overground.

Oswaldo decides to head home and let me look at the shops, but first we walk by the famous Teatro Massimo, in the Piazza Bellini, a beautiful baroque neighbourhood

It was here, in 1951, that Maria Callas sang Norma to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of Bellini. It's a lovely place to be - there are no cars - and we find a quiet café to enjoy an Aperol Spritz before parting ways.

Later, re-united in the hotel again, we solve the problem of accumulated bottles of wine, by sharing one sitting cozily in our room, Victor almost done on the computer, Oswaldo stretched out on the bed, and I afire with stories of my walk alone through the city. We decide to dine in the hotel, which turns out to be a good idea - delicious food served by cheerful waiter, Antonino.

On Friday there is packing to be done, which I do in my nightie. We're checking out at one, but enjoy a leisurely breakfast in the palatial morning room of the hotel, with a massive food laden table in the middle, around which revolves hungry guests and several waiters discreetly working in cream jackets, white shirts, and black pants or skirts. Easily the most elegant breakfast of our two week trip. I take a last hour-long walk in the lovely spring weather and then it's time to leave for the airport. Returning the car to Avis after dropping me and the bags at the airport turns out to be less simple than first assumed, and I stay waiting for a long time, while Oswaldo and Victor struggle with exits and roundabouts

Eventually they return and we can deal with mundane things such as the Tax-Refund and finding an airport lunch - another Caprese salad... Once through security we realize 1) that our flight to Rome is delayed (a possible chain of disaster in view of other connections to Lisbon, SP, and Rio), and 2) they're calling us on the loudspeakers.  Oswaldo disappears for a long time and comes back triumphant with new tickets. They have re-routed us to a direct flight from Rome to Rio with Alitalia. We are thrilled, of course, and on our way to Terminal G  at the Rome airport dine at the splendid RossoIntenso counter that we remember from our arrival,

where they serve great glasses of wine with very fresh tapa like food and salads. Then we spend a cramped and uneventful night on the plane. The following morning in Rio, however, there's bad surprise, when after waiting for an hour since 5.30am it turns out our luggage didn't make it - and so this blog ends on a note of suspense: what will happen? Will the suitcases come as promised tomorrow?

I hope so. 

It was a great trip.

Taormina sightseeing

On Wednesday the 23rd the weather looks uninviting when we wake up. Heavy grey clouds shroud the Etna and it’s raining. After breakfast we get our books and settle in one of the deep lobby sofas in front of glass doors facing the vulcano. But when we see a bit of blue sky, we head for a long cliffside staircase behind the castle above our hotel, which will take us directly down to the Corso. The sun is beginning to come out when we get up to the castle. We realize, because of the groups of swarthy men standing around in tuxes, that a wedding is about to take place. The women haven’t arrived yet, and, regretfully, we’re halfway down the winding path when enthusiastic applause from above announces the bride's arrival. I would have loved to see that scene.

We have the most stunning wide view in front of us – Taormina in all it’s glory, a mixture of little old clustered dwellings and luxurious hotels with fabulous swimming pools.

We’ve been hearing trilling birdsong from time to time – very like the sabiá at home in Gávea – and I recognize the bird as the blackbird so common throughout my Danish childhood. Then we reach the bottom of the stairs and enter the town center via a narrow alley.

Today we want to see the Teatro Greco, but first we stop for our first taste of a Granita de Caffè – delicious brown sludgy ice, if a bit sweet.

Then we join the many groups of tourists heading in the same direction. We stand in line for tickets behind a grim-faced Swiss man, who turns out to be leading a group of high-school students - he doesn't look amused and won't let us pass in front of him, even though he's holding a stack of student IDs in his hand. 

The spectacularly situated theatre - between the sea and the rocks, with the vivid Etna in the background

is still in use as a concert venue, like the the Teatro Greco in Syracuse. It's beautiful and strange, because you're very aware of the temporary seating, the huge snaking power cables and aluminium light towers in the middle of those dignified ruins. It must be spectacular to experience a performance there at night. As it is, it begins to rain hard on the open area, and we seek refuge in a little museum at the top, where we meet this soulful lady,

a Niobid - child of Amphion of Thebes and Niobe, who does not yet know Artemis and Apollo will shoot her and her siblings with their arrows, because her mother had committed hubris by boasting she had more children than their mother Leto had.  

On our way out I take this photo, my favorite. It's my first time traveling without a camera, only my new iPhone5, and I am quite pleased.

We go on through tiny streets overhung with flowers and oranges - the orange blossoms suffuse the air with the most wonderful scent

- until we reach the Giardini della Villa Comunale, a lovely shady park created by Lady Florence Trevelyan and given to Taormina in 1922. Again the blackbird is singing away as we admire the tropical vegetation and the fabulous views

We're beginning feel a little hungry and find a cozy pizza place, Mamma Rosa, where we share a pizza with artichokes - in spite of having seen them in the market we have yet to encounter them on a menu - and 2 large beers.

We then walk slowly through the town where shops are opening after their 12.30-4pm lunch break! and we meet little Tosca, chic in a quilted vest with fur trimming

When I have been into many shops and touched many things it's time to go home. Victor is nearby working out at a gym and will have dinner when he's done, whereas we'll go home and relax. We're still very achy after our long walk yesterday.

The Etna Birthday Trek.

I wake up early thinking of the very tall 27 year old sleeping down the hall and of his birth in a clinic in Gávea. What a happy day!
This day, too will be happy. I watch the mountain, where a mixture of clouds and smoke obfuscate the summit, against a grey, possibly rain-laden, sky, and hope the weather will clear.

At 7.30 we burst into Victor's room, singing "Happy Birthday" loudly - and even the lengthy and detailed Danish birthday song - thus ensuring that he will be up and awake when the driver comes at 9am. Oswaldo and I eat eggs for breakfast feeling we'll need the proteins - I even have marvellous sauteed vegetables - but Victor has a brief cup of coffee and disappears to take his shower. At 9 we're ready, well almost - guess who's not - all dressed in many layers. I must have about 30 zippered pockets on my body between one thing and another! Our driver and guide, Gaetano, aka "Tano," is a tanned and fit Dr. Frossard look alike. He is also a geology teacher and outdoors person who loves to hike and ski, and drives a nice green jeep.

He has brought jackets for the rain splatters that hit us as we eventually get to the base camp, constructed in the path of black lava from the multiple eruptions in 2002. He has also brought extra pairs of walking sticks, which turn out to be invaluable, giving us balance and force as we trudge uphill from 1820m to 2120m, where the air - and one's breath - gets a little thinner. The walk up is quite demanding for us, but we stop to see signs of earlier destruction - this was a hotel

and these trees kept standing while the lava flowed around them. 

The lava is very black and in some places vegetation has started after the excavation and construction of the path on which we're walking - in spite of the thistlely look the plants are called 'pillows.'

But most importantly there are the awesome views of the tallest crater behind the snowclad other and older craters. 

When we think we cannot walk another step Tano urges us ahead to see a special crater in the middle of mounds of crumbly black lava.

This is when a fierce wind sets in, making us feel we easily could tumble into a crater. Finally - remembering very clearly my wheelchair experience in Greece, I refuse to venture down a slippery and gravelly ledge in the storm (du-uh!) and Oswaldo and I sit holding on to each other on a windswept plateau (glad to sit down!) while Victor and Gaetano forge ahead on a rather narrow ledge to see an endless and very dark hole, which is the deepest crater.

This, Victor reports, was very scary, and thus his birthday has been like no other. The walk down, with the growing wind and the occasional lashing rain makes us walk in silence, thinking of the wine-tasting ahead. At the end it is a very tired birthday boy, who sits waiting for the car. By then we have walked for 3 1/2 hours.

We almost fall asleep in our seats as Gaetano drives us down the mountains and through the vineyard landscape. But we perk up when we arrive at the stately Gambino estate, where we will taste four different wines and enjoy some local delicacies. We love the fruity white wine Tifeu, and the red Cantari, and when they learn it's Victor's birthday, he gets to choose a bottle. Thus we leave with the smooth, chocolatey Cantari. We still stop for an ice-cream and buy several almond sweets, and then Gaetano drops us at the hotel. We sink into the lobby's large sofas and order coffee - lots of coffee - and munch on our sweets, while we swap pictures, and Victor checks his many Facebook birthday greetings. Luckily the wi-fi, not working yesterday, has been fixed. Then we go back to our rooms, have hot baths - and it's all over. We're just exhausted after this very active day and never leave our beds again.

Next stop: Taormina

We are off to a slow start, regretfully leaving the Hotel Algilá comfort and friendly staff. The weather seems a little brisker, but before noon we’re on our way north out of the city. Victor is at the wheel, and we watch, appalled, the bumper to bumper endless line of cars headed for the city, luckily going in the opposite direction. 

We enter the freeway, which heads up the coast past Catania to Taormina, with the great Etna cloaked in mists and only partly visible. Several times traffic slows to a halt, only to continue later as if nothing had happened. There are many long tunnels. The trip, which should have taken about 1 ½ hours, takes more than 2. We will later learn that Easter Monday "La Pasquetta" is a national holiday in Italy, devoted to going out with the family - most of which seem to have chosen Taormina as a destination! Finally we turn off the freeway and drive into Taormina, a warren of buildings high and low, old and under construction, clinging to the rocks. Our hotel, Villa Angela, is above the city after many, many tight hairpin turns. The GPS lady, “Kate”, is going crazy in her educated way, suggesting u-turn after u-turn, until we turn her off, relying on Google maps on the iPhone. Suddenly we’re there, at a great yellow structure hanging on the hill with a fabulous view of the volcano and of the sea. 

 We have rooms with balconies and sit in the sun sharing the rest of a bottle of Don Corleone, a not outstanding red wine – “probably made by mafiosos,” grumbles Oswaldo. Then we catch a shuttle down to the famed town center. We’re amazed when the narrow Corso Umberto I is filled to the brim with wandering tourists. “Like a subway exit,” declares Oswaldo. We’re hungry, though, and dive into a garden restaurant, “Il Ciclope." 

dedicated to an Italian/American translator and writer, Frances Winwar, who braved the Ellis Island experience (all this I get off my phone) to live in NY, go through 4 husbands, translate important Italian literature, and write her own historic romances. The woman who serves our table inspires confidence as well, deftly handling our orders, unperturbed by the (for Sicilians) weird 4.30pm lunch hour. Preceded by a great Aperol, 

we eat surprisingly well. I have homemade Gnocchi ai Funghi. 

Then we brave the crowds again, finding on the one side a church entrance swathed in pink tulle,

and on the other a spectacular view to the curve of azure sea, into which some unsettling white liquid seems to be gushing.

We will later learn it is mud from recent rain. They claim there is no pollution.

Then we’re pushing through the press of people again

until we must have an ice-cream, mine a combination of Nutella and Sicilian Flavor (i.e. w/pistachios). Victor is sticking to his no-carb diet when he can’t work out, and doesn’t have any. We begin to long for space and quiet and head back to where the hotel van will pick us up. Once back at the hotel I see a conservatively dressed gentleman having a coffee on the balcony, enjoying the view, and I suggest Oswaldo and I do the same. While I wait for him to return from our room, where he has gone to leave our things, a blue-blazered friend joins the man and they begin to chat. There is something familiar about their voices. Wait, they’re speaking in Danish! I go over and introduce myself as a fellow Dane, just in case they’d think they are speaking in all confidence. They find this amusing – “we’re talking state secrets here” - and tell me about their trip yesterday to Etna. Very cold, they warn me.Victor comes to our room to correct SAT essays on Oswaldo’s computer, while I try out the Jacuzzi in our bathroom. We have an early start tomorrow with our birthday boy, when a jeep will pick us up at 9am for an 8 hour excursion to Etna, followed by lunch and wine-tasting at a vineyard. We hope the mists will have cleared by tomorrow for his special birthday celebration.

Easter Sunday in Syracuse

This is the day we should have gotten into the car and driven south and inland to Noto and Ragusa. It seems, however, much more tempting to just continue our dawdling around this lovely place. First decision is to beat the breakfast crowd, and we throw on some clothes and are amongst the first in the empty dining room, where tiny chocolate eggs have been placed on every place setting, and the splendid breakfast display as yet unravished:

Then we decide it's time to see the mainland part Syracuse, and, when Victor is awake, we set out on foot to cross one of the bridges, passing on the way a street fair with a truck full of cheeses and cold cuts

 and an improvised tasting of ouriços - sea urchins - with the scraped out orange innards, which can't be seen here, served in little plastic cafezinho cups :(

We've been told it's a 25 minute walk to the Parco Archeologico della Neapolis, and so it is, uphill the Corso Gelone, crowded with the families, which have spilled out of church in their Sunday best. We finally find the entrance and see the Anfiteatro Romano, used for gladiatorial combats and horse races - you can still see the walkways beneaths the seats - in some way reminiscent of the Plazas del Toros that I recently saw in Seville and Ronda.

Further on lies the massive pleasteau of the  Ara de Nerone, a sacrificial place, where up to 450 oxen could be offered at the same time. Then we wander into a valley to see the huge grotto called the Ear of Dionysos,

 

because it was said he could listen to his prisoners, 7000 Syracusians, trapped in a limestone quarry beyond its walls - the acustics are perfect in the 23m high space. Finally we find the Teatro Greco, still in use for the plays of Aeschylus, played in the early spring. We'll just miss a performance.

Out again on the road we follow the fence along an immense gorge, now filled with flowering trees and blackbirds singing, but which was used as the prison for the losers of the 413BC war between Athens and Syracuse. We're looking for Archimedes grave as marked on our map, but only find abandoned excavations behind rusty fences.
We find a cab to take us back to Ortigia (15 euros - almost Danish prices!) and resolve to have pizza and a beer on the Piazza de Duomo, doing some people-watching, in fact seeing many of the people that were in the park, pass by us.
An ice-cream beckons, mine pistachio on a stick covered with white chocolate and chopped pistachio nut. Divine.
Victor resolves to walk home along the sea to work, and Oswaldo and I go in seach of the puppet museum. We find it, and wait and wait for it to open, but it never does, and then we too go home for a long and deserved nap. There is no way we can eat a single thing anymore and stay in, sipping  a little Don Corleone red wine and chatting with a Japanese looking Victor, who has just finished all 1500 pages of Hurakami's Kafka on the Shore.

We've passed the middle of our trip and leave tomorrow for Taormina, possibly via Noto, which apart from being a pretty baroque town is renowned for having the 2 best icecream places in the world! 

A Saturday of dolce far niente

On Saturday we wake late to face a crowded breakfast room full of tempting delicacies, freshly squeezed blood orange juice at the healthier end of the spectrum, with moist almond and chocolate cakes at the other, more sinful, end. Victor has coffee with us and then goes for a shower. We step outside to admire the hotel facade

and the coast promedade in both directions. It is warm and spring-like.

Oswaldo reads the Corriere della Sera,

and when Victor is ready, we head out in the sun - first towards the Diana fountain on the Piazza Archimede

behind which is a museum dedicated to one of the greatest mathematicians in the world (says Oswaldo). We wander on in the direction of the Duomo

and then follow the sea around the tip of the island

until it's time for a snack.

Then we go to the Archimedes museum, which is interestingly hands-on, and where Oswaldo and Victor have a field day.

In my time math classes stopped when you entered high school to study languages, so all of this, unfortunately, means little to me, although I do recognize the π sign! Oswaldo tells us many heroic Archimedes stories. He apparently conceived how to fortify the island against the Roman invadors, but was himself killed by a Roman soldier, when he was in his 70s. The soldier had no idea who was his victim.

We rush to have an elegant lunch at Don Camillo, but it is late and although they swear there's time to eat, they are anxious for us to go. In addition I have discovered a pear in my bag has smothered everything in pearjuice and wilted peel, so I have to take everything out and clean it. The lunch is OK - no more than that - but we do enjoy a lovely Cometa white from the Planeta estate.

After lunch we head down the fashionable Corso Matteotti, where Victor and I manage to find some great bargains - most importantly the black patent wingtip Dolcis, which have been waiting for Victor at a modest 100 euros. All set for the weddings now! Then we head home - exhausted - and never move again. Victor has providentially bought some very thinly sliced ham, sun-dried tomatoes, and a fresh mozzarella, and eats his meal with gusto, sitting in our room, jiggling his knee ;)