An Italian Holiday -- Part 4, The West Coast of Sicily

One of the ancient temples at Selinunte, Sicily

On the advice of a well-traveled friend, we decided that our final stop in Italy would be a visit to the island of Sicily.  It was a great choice.  Sicily sits in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, closer to the coast of Africa than to Rome.  The island has been a popular port of call for thousands of years.  On our short holiday we only had time to explore a small part of the large island.  We chose the west side and made the town of Trapani, an old fishing port on the northwest coast, our base.  We quickly discovered that old takes on a new dimension in Sicily.  The earliest settlements on the rugged island ended their glory days more than 2500 years ago.  While I expected Sicily to be memorable for its cuisine: fresh seafood, dry, slightly effervescent wine and delicious olives, it was the ancient ruins that set the place apart for me.  Roving seafarers have been stopping off on the island and benefitting from its fertile soils since long before the first Olympics were held in Greece.  But despite the island’s long history, it isn’t wealthy or, at least in April, crowded.  A feeling of gritty survival and hard work permeates the part of the island we had the pleasure of visiting.

My favorite fountain in Trapani

Our hotel, a nineteenth century residence in the center of Trapani’s old town had been retrofitted with an elevator and modern plumbing.  The whole place had an air of faded charm.  Our room on the fourth floor included a roof top deck that overlooked the bright green dome of the church next-door and the chimneys and stone walls of the neighboring apartment buildings.  You don’t see traditional single-family houses in the old part of Trapani.  The narrow streets are lined with severe apartment buildings, typically four or five stories high with balconies that overlook the treeless streets.  It was about 2 o’clock in the afternoon by the time we drove into town from the local airport, past windmills and salt flats, found the hotel hidden among the winding streets, and got settled.  We were hungry!  On the proprietor’s advice we sought out a nearby delicatessen and a small bakery, purchasing tomatoes, oranges, salami, crusty rolls, cold beer and fizzy water.  We took our lunch up to the roof top deck and collapsed gratefully onto the wicker couches.  The five of us hungrily devoured the delicious food in the bright afternoon sun.  

After lunch we set out to explore.  The old downtown streets are full of restaurants and bars, fountains and churches. A few blocks from the residence, we walked through a wrought iron gate onto a promenade that followed the boat-filled curve of the beach.  We watched two young boys, fresh from school change into wet suits and splash into the water for an afternoon of snorkeling.  I put my hand into the water.  Despite the hot sun, the water felt cold to my touch.  I was glad I wasn’t snorkeling!  At the end of the promenade, an ancient fort, almost Moorish in its architecture, protected the bay.   

We arranged to spend the next day sailing to the nearby Egadi Islands on a 40-foot catamaran, the Alien. [see website http://www.aliencat.it/#_=_]

We walked to the nearby dock at 9 am and by 9:05 we were sailing out of the small harbor.  My only previous experience of a catamaran was on a small 16-foot Hobie Cat. 

The Alien was a whole different world and our hosts Alessandro and Isabelle were wonderful.  First stop was an open bay on the east coast of the largest of the Egadi Islands, Favignana.  During the course of the next eight hours we explored three different bays on Favignana and took a short dip in the clear turquoise water of the most remote bay.  Favignana’s coastline is very rocky, in some places steep cliffs fall precipitously to the sea, while in other areas, the coast is more gentle and filled with blooming flowers and wind swept trees.  

Our hosts prepared delicious food on board – plying us first with home made bruschetta and light sparkling white wine and then a delicious lunch of spaghetti with a rich Bolognese (meat and tomato) sauce.  Later in the afternoon, when the wind came up and we were skimming lightly across the waves, Isabelle made a fresh fruit salad and Alessandro gave us all little cups of a sweet Sicilian port wine.  They even had an espresso machine on board.  Talk about hospitality.  We lay on the net trampolines, swung on the string hammock, lounged on the back deck and generally enjoyed ourselves.  If you are ever feeling tense and need to just get the worries of the world out of your system, I can recommend lying on a net trampoline and sailing on the Mediterranean!  The experience is like no other – you lie suspended as if floating in air with the fresh salt wind in your face and the water rushing by below you. 

It is an exhilarating experience and on the Alien you don’t even have to know how to sail!  By the time we arrived back at the dock it was 6:30 in the evening.  We were relaxed, full and happy.  We hugged our hosts and wandered back to the residence for a much needed shower.  That night we planned our next adventure, a visit to the ruins of Selinunte, an ancient Greek city on the southwestern coast. 

Temple columns that never left the quarry

Early Sunday morning we left our hotel and found an open supermarket and bakery – the all day excursion called for another picnic lunch.  We stocked up on our favorites: rolls, salami, tomatoes, fruit and water, packed into the car and drove south.  First stop was the limestone quarry Cave di Cusa where giant Doric columns for the Selinunte temples had been mined more than 3000 years ago.  The road from Trapani to Cusa was lined with farms, olive trees, vineyards, and fields of hay spread across the rolling landscape.  Here and there we drove through small towns and villages where folks were out and about, all dressed in Sunday best.  The parking lot at Cusa is little more than an open field.  From there we followed a small sign to the ticket booth.  The whole area was wild and deserted, already dry despite it being late spring.  Golden grass, feathery fennel and wildflowers grew everywhere.  After buying tickets, we walked up a small path through tall grass, wondering if we were even going in the right direction.  Then down a small turn we saw two massive column sections, side by side in the ground.  We walked around them, awed by their size and the precision of their carving.  Further into the quarry, we found other limestone deposits, and the remains of other, partially carved columns, abandoned thousands of years ago when invading Carthaginians conquered Selinunte in 409 BC.

A temple in ruins 

Cave di Cusa was a good introduction to the glory that was Selinunte. Greeks from the eastern Sicilian city of Megara Hyblaeathe founded Selinunte sometime in the seventh century BC.  Although the town and its majestic temples lay in ruins from the conquerors for centuries and were further damaged by earthquakes hundreds of years later, the scale and grandeur of the ancient settlement are extraordinary.  The whole archeological park is huge and beautiful, with open views south to the sea.  We wandered around the largest re-constructed temple and into and out of the nearby temple ruins. 

We found a perfect picnic spot and rested briefly in the shade.  After lunch we walked along sandy trails that threaded through dry woods and fields to the site of the town, where another temple has been re-built.  We explored the old streets and each chose our favorite “house” although to be honest, every house had a spectacular view both of the sea and the holy temples on the eastern hill.  There is very limited knowledge about the history of Selinunte – the whole area was forgotten for centuries and its re-construction is still underway. 

Selinunte is well worth a visit.  There is a feeling of ancient neglect in the park – as you wander around the temples and among the gigantic fallen columns, you can almost feel the horror of the ancient inhabitants as they realized their holy sites and their homes were destroyed.

We left Selinunte and drove up the seacoast back to Trapani just in time to catch cocktails, dinner and the sunset.  On our last day in Sicily we visited the medieval walled town of Erice with its beautiful stone streets.  That evening we ate fresh Sicilian seafood for the last time.  I hope to return to Sicily on another holiday and visit more of its weathered, hauntingly beautiful landscape – and ideally – take another sailing trip on the lovely Alien!  In the meantime I am experiencing summer and local food in another delightful island community – the San Juan Islands – my next blog….

An Italian Holiday -- Part 3, the Ligurean Coast

A beach on the Ligurean coast

The train from Florence to Nervi takes about four hours.  You change trains in La Spezia.  When we arrived at La Spezia we had less than ten minutes to make our connection.  By luck or design, our connecting train was on the same platform.  It looked easy.  But as my family tried to board the train along with many other passengers, all carrying backpacks and suitcases, the forward momentum of the crowd stopped abruptly right at open door to the carriage.  The entry way was blocked by a crush of bodies and baggage.  I was the last person in our group and was left standing on the platform, unable to board.  I assumed the crowd would disperse quickly into the carriage but after five minutes there was no movement.  I shoved my way into the crowd, squeezing onto the train, afraid it would start moving and I’d be left behind.  Everyone was crammed together in the small entry to the train car.  Suddenly, a man near the interior door lifted a young woman up bodily and brusquely moved her out of the way.  Everyone breathed a sigh of relief and moved easily into the carriage.  My family quickly found four seats across the aisle from each other.  The young woman and her companion, who we realized had been intentionally blocking the entrance, entered the same carriage after everyone else was seated.  There were only two seats left right by the door.  As the young women sat down, the train jerked and we were off.  The conductor entered the car almost immediately.  I assumed he was there to check our tickets but instead he was there to warn us.  An Italian woman sitting across from me translated his stern message.  “Look out for that girl” he said looking contemptuously at the young woman who had caused the delay.  “She’ll pick your pocket.  We know her.”  The young woman was listening and trying to look completely disinterested.  It turned out that the young women were known pickpockets on the popular tourist train line.  In blocking entry to the interior door they hoped to get lots of people crowded together and a better chance of picking our pockets.  The gentleman who’d forcibly moved her had recognized what was happening.  The conductor told us the twosome ride the train routinely hoping to steal from tourists.  The lesson: if you are travelling in Italy (or perhaps some other places where tourists flock) and a crowd suddenly appears for no obvious reason, guard your belongings!

Every seat in our carriage was taken.  We were on the train that goes along the Ligurean coast, that is, the Italian Riviera.  First stop was the southern most town of the popular Cinque Terra towns, Monterosso.  Almost everyone, including the pickpockets got out.  It was a diverse and international crowd: school kids and chaperones on spring break, back packers and well-dressed tourists, old and young filled the platform.  We were very pleased to stay on the now empty train.  We were going to Nervi, the small Genovese suburb that our daughter Sasha and her boyfriend Dustin had called home since September.  The train ride is just beautiful.  Small rocky coves, beaches and tiny little villages come in and out of view. 

The villages are a kaleidoscope of pink and yellow stucco buildings, decorated with bright green shutters, intricate balconies and balustrades all painted in trompe l’oeil style.  Trompe l’oeil means to deceive the eye by painting objects so that they appear to be real.  At first I was completely tricked.  Gradually I realized that what I thought were real shutters and balconies were simply colorful painted pictures, real only in the eye of the beholder.

We arrived at the Nervi train station about 2 in the afternoon.  We disembarked and walked under the train tracks in a purpose built tunnel.  As we came out of the tunnel, the sparkling Mediterranean was in full view.  We stood gazing out to sea on a 2-km, oceanfront walkway that runs the length of Nervi.  It is called the Passeggiata Anita Garibaldi.  Anita’s famous husband, Giuseppe Garibaldi, is from Genoa.  He is a very important person in the recent history of Italy.  During the late 19^th century, Garibaldi had the wisdom to unify Italy’s many city-states into a single nation, thereby strengthening their ability to remain independent from the many nations that coveted their wealth.  But Garibaldi’s wisdom was not only in enabling independence through unification but also in allowing each of the strong city-states to keep their local character and cultural heritage.  Thus, even today, more than 100 years later, each major city in Italy, Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan, Naples and Genoa retains its unique identity and, of course, its pride.

Cose Buone = Good Things

The Passeggiata Anita Garibaldi is glorious.  The herringbone-patterned red brick is set above the sea, carved sinuously into the rocky cliffs.  There are wrought iron street lamps and comfortable wooden benches facing out to sea every few yards.  The day we arrived, the path was full of people: old folks with walkers and sometimes wheelchairs, young families with strollers, kids learning how to bike, twenty and thirty something joggers, groups of immaculately dressed ladies strolling in the afternoon sun.  We walked the mile to Sasha’s apartment and entered their building directly from the Passeggiata.  Once upstairs in their apartment, we gawked at the 180 ^o view of the Mediterranean.  That afternoon surrounded by water and sky, I did a yoga video, streamed from my laptop.  How great to properly stretch my body after all the urban walking and train travelling.  Later, we wandered through the little town to buy pasta and cheese, veggies and focaccia for dinner, each purchase at a separate specialty shop.  I marveled at Sasha’s language proficiency – knowing from my own experience in Brazil how much work it takes to speak fluently in another language.

The boat harbor in Camogli

After our busy schedules in Venice and Florence, our program for the next few days was intentionally low key.  We planned to visit several little villages along the coast, traveling by train, boat, bike and foot and spend as much time as possible in Sasha and Dustin’s adopted neighborhood rather than explore the big city of Genoa.  It was a good choice.  The next day we walked the beautiful Passeggiata, completed our food shopping then bicycled to the next town for lunch.  It was a short but picturesque ride along the Mediterranean coast and over part of the route of the Giro d’Italia – an internationally famous bicycle road race that has been held in Italy since 1909!  We certainly aren’t international road racers but we felt pretty pleased to ride on a bit of the famous course.  Once at our destination, Camogli, we sat at an outdoor café, enjoyed the fresh, perfectly cooked seafood and watched the boats come and go from the adjacent small fishing harbor.  The fresh sea air was invigorating and the bicycle ride back to Nervi was mercifully short.

San Fruttuoso, the Abbey and Tower

On our last day in Nervi, Dustin’s mother Karen joined us.  Our day was full!  We started with a 20-minute train ride back to Camogli.  From there, we hopped the coastal ferry and plowed through waves to reach the tiny cove of San Fruttuoso.  San Fruttuoso is set among rugged rocks above a small beach.  It is the home of a 13^th century abbey that now includes a small museum.  Above the abbey, a fortified tower, set in the hillside, guards the tiny 

village.  We wandered through the abbey and its excavated dungeons, and marveled at its 900-year old history.  We enjoyed the historical exhibits that highlighted, among other things, the culinary achievements of the Ligurean coasts.  Who knew that pesto and focaccia were both invented in this wild and beautiful region?  Afterwards, we scrambled up steep stone steps to a restaurant.  We ate fresh fish and drank cold white wine sitting on the edge of a cliff that overlooked the beach and the abbey.  

The view from the trail

Properly fortified, we set out on a 6-mile hike to Portofino!  The path was very steep and crumbly but ridiculously picturesque.  We walked through deep oak and pine forests, enjoying endless views across the Mediterranean and wild roses and wildflowers.  On the final part of the hike, we passed through terraced vineyards and olive groves hanging on the hillsides above Portofino. 

Terraced Vineyards along the trail

Portofino is a more “discovered” seaside resort replete with expensive boutiques and open-air cafés set around the central piazza.  While we enjoyed the colorful boats in the harbor, we all agreed that we preferred the rustic charm and relative isolation of San Fruttuoso!  After a rest and a well-earned snack of tasty gelato, we continued walking along the coast towards Santa Margherita, the next town east.  From there we took the train back to Nervi, arriving just in time for the cocktail hour!  We prepared cold drinks, fresh melon and prosciutto.  We were tired and pleased with our day’s adventure – more than 10 miles hiking and visits to three memorable villages.  I love the fact that we traveled by train, boat and foot all on the same day. 

Early the next morning, we walked to the train station and traveled in the opposite direction – west towards the Genoa Airport and our plane to Sicily.  I wonder how different life in Seattle would be if a similarly good network of train tracks and footpaths crisscrossed the region.  Maybe easily accessible trains and walking paths would encourage all of us to get out of our cars, get some exercise and visit new places?