Day 28

Buongiorno,

We had a late start to the morning. Koro did not sleep very well. The TV in our room kept turning itself on at strange times. It would just start all by itself. Koro said it was the ghosts turning it on. Grandma told Koro to be quiet.

Being a Sunday our choice of breakfast restaurant was pretty limited, so it was a tourist trap breaky.

A traditional European breakfast seems to be a croissant, an orange juice and an espresso. Not very much at all. Followed by a large lunch, then a three course dinner.

Grandma cannot eat croissants (the pastry is full of butter), and hates coffee. And Grandma’s breakfast is usually large, at least three courses when we are at home.

So breakfasts can sometimes be hard to find.

One of the aspects of Sicilian life is that traditional open air food markets are still strongly supported. Modern supermarkets have not wiped them out, in fact they seem to be thriving. Catania has a very famous fish market. Although a Sunday morning is not the best time to visit, the range of fresh seafood was impressive.

Once more into the crazy traffic of Catania. Don’t drive past a church in Catania on a Sunday morning. It’s complete bedlam.

Catania is a dirty city. There is rubbish everywhere, even along the edge of the Autostrada. It looks like people have thrown bags of

rubbish out of the car window while driving along the Autostrada.

As we headed South to Siracusa (Syracuse), the landscape changed and become cleaner. Beautifully kept little citrus and olive plantations.

Siracusa is a revelation. The traffic is Italian, but not suicidal. The place is clean and well kept. We already like Siracusa. It has relatively wide streets, at least on the mainland, and is quite flat.

We are staying in B&B Nostos, which is beautiful. It is more like a small hotel than a B&B. The building has been beautifully and thoughtfully renovated. It is very spacious and comfortable. The shower is spectacular, and Grandma wants to bring it home.

Siracusa was founded as a Greek colony in the 5th century BC. It grew to be a very large and wealthy city, and was the largest city in the world, larger even than Athens.

Siracusa was the birthplace of the great scientist, Archimedes. He was the guy famous for running down the street naked shouting “Eureka, eureka!”

Archimedes was born in Siracusa, studied for a while in the Egyptian city of Alexandria, then returned to Siracusa. Archimedes is famous for defining the principles of the lever, pulleys, and the Archimedes Screw. The principles he defined underlies the design of components we use in our machines today.

Our first afternoon in Siracusa was spent on the island of Ortigia. This is a small island that is almost connected to the mainland of Sicily. There are two bridges you can walk across to get to Ortigia, and the island is only 200 metres from B&B Nostos.

Ortigia was the original settlement of Siracusa, a small, easily defended island with two natural ports. Ortigia was a centre renowned for ship building, and at one point the two harbors were home to 160 different shipyards.

The island is beautiful. It is very clean, and a lot of the public spaces look like they have been recently renovated and upgraded. As usual, lots of narrow walkways and winding allies to get lost in. Although the island is so small, you don’t stay lost for long.

The impressive remains of a Greek temple is the first site you come across after reaching the island.

We wandered and found a museum that featured machines and inventions of the two great scientists, Leonardo and Archimedes. We have seen models of Leonardo’s inventions a couple of times, but we wanted to see Archimedes' work.

This was a great little museum, as we could play with most of the models and see for ourselves how they worked. We spent a good two hours in this excellent little museum.

Afterwards we just wandered the island. Found some lunch, wandered some more, then headed back to B&B Nostos for a rest.

Love to you all from Grandma and Koro and Buzzy Bee. XXX OOO