Day 26

Buongiorno,

We had a pretty good sleep on the ferry over. It was very smooth sailing, the only thing that annoyed us was our wardrobe doors vibrated with the engines of the ship. It made a real racket in the middle of the night. We managed to jiggle the doors at 2:00am to get them to be quiet.

We berthed just after 11:00am (very much on time), then sat and waited for our instructions. We were called to our cars, so we walked along the deck and out to our car, then just followed everyone else through the boat, onto the wharf, through the port and out into the city of Catania.

There is not much to tell you about Catania. It is not much of a tourism city, there is not that much to see. It is a port city and a university city.

Our first impression of the island of Sicily is the traffic. In the city of Catania the Sicilians have taken the degree of insanity to a whole new level. It is not unusual to be driving three abreast along a two lane road. Round-abouts are a free-for-all. Indicators are completely unnecessary. Pedestrians walk wherever they please, when ever they please. Parking occurs wherever your car stops. If that happens to be on a corner or over a pedestrian corner, or even on a road-about, then so be it. We have even had the car in front of us

stop and double park on the exit of a round about. As Grandma said, you have to really concentrate, because there is just so much happening all around you.

The scooters are completely mad kamikaze pilots. They only have two speeds; stopped, and warp speed. Nothing in between. Helmets? Helmets are not used, presumably because they make a mess of one’s hair, and that would just not do.

So far on our adventure Koro has been enjoying the driving. Catania has been just too crazy. While driving on the Italian mainland was fun, so far Catania has been stupid. You do feel like if you get distracted and make one mistake, then you could be in trouble.

The city itself, what we have seen of it, is nice. We are staying in the heart of the historic centre. Our hotel is very nice, with spacious rooms. We can walk to wherever we need to go. The buildings are old and some of the streets are narrow.

Surprisingly, some of the streets are very wide boulevards.

While Catania is very old, in fact a settlement dating back to the Athenian empire, it was largely destroyed by an earthquake that struck Sicily in 1693. The earthquakes also caused tsunamis, and almost two thirds of the population of Catania were killed.

So while the architecture is largely from the Baroque period (from about 1620 until 1750-ish), there are still some very old ruins left over from the Roman empire.

Sicily has a long and complicated history. Being in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, it was a natural hub for trade. Thus the culture has absorbed influences from many regions. The Greeks came up with the idea of using a little bit of honey to sweeten Ricotta cheese made from sheep’s milk. The Arabs introduced sugar cane as an alternative sweetener to honey. And they brought citrus fruits with them as well. The Spanish brought sponge cake and chocolate.

What did the Sicilians do? They took all of these ingredients and came up with Cassata. The most dangerous food known to Koro’s tummy. It is a cake made up of layers of liqueur soaked sponge cake, sweetened Ricotta and almond paste. Sometimes wrapped in green marzipan, or just lightly dusted with icing sugar (Koro’s fave) and decorated with candied fruits. It is light, just slightly sweet (not sickly sweet), and very addictive.

The Sicilians also take this Ricotta mix and use it to fill hard pastry shells. They look like a brandy snap. These are called Cannoli and again they are very dangerous for Koro’s tummy.

We walked, we saw the cathedral, we found the ruins of an old Roman theatre. Only a portion of it is visible, and the buildings surrounding it have all been built over the top of the old theatre ruins.

We discovered a beautiful church that was preparing for a wedding. The wedding planner was a very buff young man wearing a very thin, almost see through T Shirt, a suit jacket, distressed denim jeans and shoes with no socks. He was issuing lots of orders about how to lay out the flowers. He seemed to know a lot about flowers.

We discovered the most amazing pet shop. Actually, we aren’t sure if it was a pet shop, or a clothing store. It sold very high end clothes for pets, mostly dogs, but also rabbits. Very expensive looking feeding bowls, harnesses, leads. Even furniture - doggy beds in all shapes

and sizes. A cat’s play tower that made the one Ollie and Otis have look small and sad.

Rufus would have been in his element. I can just see Rufus picking out handful of frocks then trotting off to the changing rooms to try them on.

The stuff was pretty expensive, but we reckon the the shop would do some really good business the way people treat their pets.

The weather has certainly changed, it is a bit cooler (still over 20 degrees and humid), and raining off and on.

Back at the church the guests were arriving and the groom was standing at the top of the steps waiting. That’s the groom’s job, to wait. It never ends.

A small crowd had gathered to watch and wait for the bride to arrive, so we decided to wait as well. Grandma decided, Koro did as he was told. I hope the Groom noted that lesson.

The bride duly arrived and looked beautiful. Although Koro thought the Maserati Quattoporte she arrived in looked every bit as good. The driver of the Maserati turned up the stereo, which was playing Ed Sheeran’s song “Perfect”. The crowd that had gathered to watch all burst into applause (even Koro clapped).

This evening it has been raining pretty heavily. We just wanted a quick and easy meal from somewhere close by. The people at the hotel recommended a place they go to just up the road.

It was only fifty metres away, and it was a great meal. Very simple food, huge portions (neither of us could finish), beautifully cooked. We couldn’t hear English being spoken at any of the other tables, it was all Italian. No tourists, only locals. Two huge plates of pasta, two drinks each, €33. Incredible value for money.

The only problem? The menu had a lot of horse meat (no lamb, one chicken dish, one steak dish, some pork, the rest horse meat). Grandma was not impressed.

We are happy and tired now, so we are off to bed. This is a very old building, so Koro will have to lie close to Grandma to keep the ghosts away.

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