Musings

Near the northwestern edge of Mount Etna’s flows you can find the gorges of the Simeto (shallow compared to those in southeastern Sicily, like Pantelleria and Fiume Cassibile), with the four-arched (now) Saracen bridge crossing the flow (at 37.70094,14.79976; you can see the span in satellite view) northwest of Adrano.

I’m not sure how much of what we saw is ancient, or if mostly it’s just the stones—some of them—that are ancient, but the bridge is fascinating, with its undulating deck and multi-colored stones. I found the alternating light/dark of the facing stones of the arches mesmerizing.

From there, we went north-ish to Randazzo, then crossed the mountains to the north, sneaking peeks at Mount Etna in the rearview mirror. The pass where we left it behind was a gap, and unremarkable. On the north slope, we found trees, especially pines, whereas the south slope was mostly denuded (or with no trees)—as you can see in the bridge photo. Not sure how factors like prevailing weather patterns, soils, etc. play into this.

Posted at 2:48 PM | Comments Off on The Simeto’s old bridge

Always, the tricky thing about archaeological finds is “saving” them. Stabilizing whole residential complexes of wall bases and Roman mosaic floors here at the Villa Romana del Casale is a major engineering project. I’m still amazed that conservators let you walk on some of the floors—on mosaic fragments. However, huge protective roofs and elevated walkways for the tourists are transforming this hillside into what looks like a series of greenhouses from afar. The corollary is that often shadows make study of the figures and designs in the mosaics, umm, difficult. And superheated.

The lower zone of Morgantina includes the agora, stoa, granaries, and stores—a wide variety of special-use architecture, while the long-ago Greeks (well, their slaves) built residential architecture on the distant hilltop and the one I’m standing on, overlooking the core area of the settlement. The size of the bouleterion, or steps where citizens sat when they met to deliberate about community business, indicates Morgantina had a substantial population—and this was the mid-400s BC. And, yes, that’s a theater just peeking out from the vegetation in the right foreground.

Note how from this city, the residents could monitor activity over a wide area below. Note that their gleaming buildings could likewise be seen from a huge surrounding area.

Here’s a sample of the good eats we’ve been enjoying—the antipasti we had tonight—two meats, three cheeses, an egg omelette(?), a cold rice salad, three veg, and a breadcrumb-stuffed red pepper. The meatloaf that arrived several courses later was tender and outstanding, with just a tiny bit of finocchio selvatico (wild fennel) as part of the flavoring, I was told. I guessed mint, but that’s probably because I know the Italian for it (menta), and I thought the flavor similar.

My vocabulary widens—slowly.

I am full. And that is all. (Hat’s off to KW for this style of sign-off.)

Posted at 3:53 PM | 2 Comments »

View ENE from cliffs above Castellammare del Golfo (Yes, the water is really that color). See the terrain in Google Maps by clicking here. Note that there’s a fortress-castle on the point that closes in CdelG’s harbor.

I did not understand how rugged the coasts of Sicily are. This is the NW corner of the island, looking back to the east. On the headland in the distance (left rear) is Palermo’s airport.

Notable facts from today, in no particular order:

• We are now a traveling duo, having said a heartfelt goodbye to our fine traveling companions at that same airport.
• We saw our first Prius in Italy, a shiny black one, arriving at the airport two cars ahead of us.
• Castellammare del Golfo was the port town for Segesta (37.94068,12.83426), which in ancient times controlled travel through the pass inland from Castellammare toward population centers in the SW part of the island.
• We did learn some lessons in the high art of snacking from F, although we did very well on our own today scoring a black-olive laced baguette to go with tiny mozzarelle spheres from the SISA up the road.
• Up by San Vito lo Capo we saw an abandoned tuna factory, including a net management area and housing for the fisher-dudes. The owners closed it in the late 1960s.

• We saw evidence of recent land speculation near San Vito lo Capo, across a bleak ocean-view terrain, partly cleared of its rocks (that’s a bulldozer out there), with boundary walls marking lots. Normally, we have seen unfinished or only partly occupied apartment buildings as evidence of the same over-development. For over a kilometer here, all we saw were stone walls, no houses, no gates, even.
• We begin our migration east and north tomorrow.

* “Blu” is Italian for blue.

Posted at 12:19 PM | 1 Comment »

We got caught by the spring weather today.

And, we caught mass at the famous duomo (cathedral) at Monreale, outside of Palermo. The roof is so far above, it’s hard to fathom. Plus, the glow of the gold when they brought the lights up for mass almost took my breath away. Probably no one, perhaps intentionally, recorded how many laborers worked to build this building, begun in 1174. The local masses made a poor showing at today’s noon mass, and the priest criticized us tourists for showing up. We got that much from the Italian.

Still, we did cough up 6 euros each to visit the cloister, which meant we got to walk all four sides of the huge courtyard. Very scenic, surely, but I also got a bit queasy thinking about the lives lost so this could be built and decorated. I didn’t have time to study the Byzantine mosaics, just caught their gleam, mostly.

So, we stopped at the first picture last (yes, they’re not in chronological order). I hesitate to mention that we descended through a side door to look at catacombs (called a necropolis here if it is Greek, Roman, or early Christian, but apparently not if it is more recent) with embalmed or otherwise preserved corpses of Capuchin monks and community notables dating to the 1800s (older ones were not on view). Exceedingly strange. Prominent signs read No Fotos and No Film, as well as Show Respect (approximately). One said No Flash; I guess they were relenting a bit. Strange, considering high windows were open to the rainy outdoors, although the rain didn’t come in, just the terrifically humid air.

Milling around before we left, we saw a bier being loaded into a van through a door next to the entry. I saw the shoes through the glass, so I know someone’s remains were, shall we say, going on tour.

The rain’s back, we have a good internet connection, and we’ve talked to some home-folks, and that’s all for now.

Posted at 1:07 PM | Comments Off on Chased by rain, we experience…strangeness

We avoided switchbacks, and their alter egos—tunnels, and took the funavia to historic hilltop Érice, which the Greeks called Eryx.

We saw churches (there are, I read, sixty of them), castles (or at least crenellations), lots of alley-streets, a few dogs and cats, some tourists (but it could have been worse), balconies, gated courtyards, and a few piazzas and salitas (“little rooms,” or openings smaller than a piazza).

When a cloud settled atop the city, we ducked into a Caffé for coffee and a sandwich, emerging when we felt the temps warm a bit.

One souvenir store we ducked into had a small shelf of Kodak 35mm print film above the cash register; I wondered what the expiration dates were on the boxes.

Posted at 10:22 PM | Comments Off on Seats eight

We did the ruins thing again today (and they were Spec Tac You Larrh!!!), but we did more….

We wandered old-town Marsala. We saw streets of marble (I think), and narrow alleys headed not-sure-where. We saw monumental churches, with the big one decorated ready for a wedding, with a red carpet from the street directly to the center aisle, and two kneeling cushions ready on the altar. We enjoyed our bonus of the practicing organist, off to the right near the front/altar.

Ya gotta love civic-ceremonial architecture!

And so, in the photo, I give you two photographers and one well-covered archaeologist amongst Selinunte’s fallen stones. This temple was never finished—they got the columns up—F on the right is standing in front of one—but they didn’t get them fluted. I think this was going to be the near-largest temple in Greek times…and built in Sicily—so maybe we skew our concept of those ancient people’s world just by using the word “Greek” in ways that make it more difficult to understand that world.

Posted at 10:22 PM | Comments Off on The day we only crease Selinunte, on the way to Marsala

A new sculpture.

The ruins of an old civic-ceremonial building.

And, believe it or not, couples still come here on their wedding day, hoping to ensure a happy marriage.

So, it’s still an active ritual center, this temple-ruin in ancient Agrigento.

Posted at 4:02 PM | Comments Off on Time overlays

I wanted to show you that we haven’t been spending all our time in rural areas (yes, still human-managed landscapes in this long-occupied region), but that we also spent time with still-occupied connurbations, or specimens from the built environment.

This balcony in Noto (known for its distinctive Sicilian Baroque architecture), is on a residential building between, I think, the city’s two major churches, although I well may be wrong.

Noto was destroyed or at least ruined greatly by the 1693 quake, and residents rebuilt the city downslope a bit, using this distinctive stone from just uphill (or are we seeing stucco over stone? I am still not sure). And the faded green of the shutters…wow!

Still, see? We can do urban!

Posted at 2:07 PM | 1 Comment »

We escaped Taormina (not chased by a bull—which may well have been the auroch in ancient times, and not our cattle), descending to the north along the main route into town (we had entered from the south, which turned out to be effectively the back way these days).

We expended what we discovered to be our meager energy given the heat tromping the reflective white limestone ruins of the civic-ceremonial architecture at Siracusa—a Greek theater, a Roman amphitheater, and a couple of other nifty places they still let you visit (most of the zone was walled off, sigh). For me, the highlight was this person-made cave (following a natural crack? I can only speculate) in the wall of the huge quarry from which the ancients (more particularly, their slaves) removed the building stones for the city. The echo is legendary because it only has a single reverb. Unfortunately, we visited this huge cavern with two (noisy) tour groups. One of the guides serenaded all of us with an a capella piece that John ID’d as from Battlestar Galactica. (I believed him, although he says it was a similar tune, but not the same.)

This view is looking out of the cave from around the bend—so striking. Legend has it that the leader Dionysius incarcerated his enemies here and could overhear their planning from afar due to the special qualities of sound transmission in this dramatic space, now called Orecchio di Dionisio.

We are now up in the limestone Hyblaean mountains in the new part of the ancient city of Palazzolo Acreide (which controlled cross-island trade routes), trying out small town life (sorta). We are staying in a nearly new hotel/winery/restaurant. We had the chef’s tasting menu for dinner and it was spectacular, about ten antipastis, including a zucchini flan that was superb, a pasta course with a mint-basil pesto over delicate cheese ravioli over a roasted red tomato sauce, two meats for the secondi, and one strawberry panna cotta with four spoons because we were so full. The Colle Acre’s own Nero ’Avila was outstanding..

Me, my tongue, and I—all so happy!

Posted at 5:06 PM | 2 Comments »

This is Taormina (think of this line intoned by a deep, male, narrator-voice).

First thing after breakfast we visited the city’s Teatro Greco.* That’s it on the top of the hill in the rear. It’s big, and it’s still used for events. We watched workmen installing decking for stage access, the stage, risers, etc., in preparation for an event. Santana is playing on the 22nd, so it may be for that.

Then we headed uphill toward Castelmola. We didn’t go all the way, and instead detoured intending to visit a Saracen castle. At the turn from the road up to the castle, we encountered a mother-daughter from Louisiana coming down who told us that the castle wasn’t open. Bummer. So we headed over to a church, which was also closed, next to an overlook of the city (paste 37.85380,15.28401 into Google Maps to know where I was standing to take this; note that the autostrada you see on the map goes through a tunnel and is nowhere near the place I was standing).

After coming up the road (and dodging vehicular traffic), we opted to go down via the walkway that’s in the vegetation in the foreground of this shot. We saw plenty of flowers, and the steps were spaced out, so our knees were not unhappy.

We discovered that these steps came out just above the alley-steps that lead down to our hotel. Cool!

Back in our hotel room, we found the wifi recalcitrant, but John finally got both our devices online. Then, we talked via iPad with friends in Texas, and Nancy in Michigan (we’ve already talked to various family members). Fun! (Connection wasn’t so hot, maybe because…we’re in Italy.)

* You have no sense of the community this civic-ceremonial space fit into; there’s just the theater with a small temple that long ago was converted into a chapel/church, and that I skipped. And we could not figure out, other than some columns and arch-topped passage ways, what was very old, what was kinda old, and what was pure reconstruction. Most seemed to be the latter, however. I found it ironic that the stage-preparation building materials were all temporary and created surfaces above the archaeological ones—at least as presented (although the WikiP entry characterizes the theater as remarkably well preserved).

Posted at 10:43 AM | 1 Comment »