Sicily - Palermo

Flew to Palermo from Tirana (Albania) via Rome with no problems from Alitalia - and the flights were even on time.

View from our apartment balcony

We have an Airbnb apartment in Palermo so are living like the locals. The apartment is very large, very stylish but the focus in on form over function to quite an extent. For example, a complex shower arrangement but the hot water takes so long to arrive that you end up standing in 10cm of water. The lights are complicated but you can't see to read in bed. The bed is very thin and hard. Oh, and there are people shouting loudly (fighting) either in neighbouring apartments of the street. As I said, it's local..... but it has a washing machine and an iron and a balcony to dry stuff.








We arrived on a major holiday but had a great meal in an attmospheric piazza.

Dinner in a Piazza

Next day was spent on the local hop on- hop off buses, with very good commentary. There is some magnificent architecture here. There were 2 highlights. The first, the Catacombs, with hundreds of dead bodies dressed in their best gear, either hanging from hooks on the walls as macabre wall art, or in open coffins. Most were leering skeltons but some were still recognisable. Seriously weird and half and hour was enough for me!

Grand architecture

The second highlight was a cathedral up on the hill overlooking Palermo, Monreale. We have never seen such extensive and beautiful mosaic bible stories.

Cathedral at Monreale

Sicilian hill town - Erice

The next day we did a thouroughly stupid thing and picked up a hire care - ie we drove in Palermo, the 4th worst city in the world to drive in. We got out OK, and happily visited Segesta (more ruins), Erice, a hill top town, via a big cable car and then the beautiful village of Castellamare.

Chic lunch in Erice

Castellomare

Castellomare

However getting into Palermo (we had to get to the port) caused huge stress. We had left 90 mins and the car was due back by 7pm - plenty of time. However the port proved thoroughly elusive and we ended up going in chaotic circles. Lester drove like a Sicilian! Weaving, tooting,tail-gating etc and with several illegal manouvers, we made it with 5 minutes to spare. Had to go and drink a bottle of Prosecco to recover!!