René Seindal

The weather has gone haywire in most of Europe, and we’ve got our part of the fun here in Sicily too. No snowstorms though, its not that extreme, but we’ve had a lots of rain, winds between force 4 and 7 and seas so rough many ferries have been deviated or had to remain in port.

The weather hasn’t given us any chances for a relaxed holiday paddle, but we’ve spend quite a bit of time with our Sicilian kayak friends Giacomo della Gatta and Salvatore Bartoli.

Salvatore has the dubious honour of having a pizza named after him at a local pizzeria, Actually the Pizza Bartoli is a very good pizza, with cherry tomatoes, mozzarella di buffala, red onion, anchovies, and a touch of rucola. We all enjoyed it immensely, except Salvo who didn’t feel well.

The day after we had a spectacular meal at Giacomo’s, with mackerel and sausages on the barbecue, salad and an unbeatable chocolatecake for dessert. Poor Salvo still didn’t feel well so most of the laughs were on him as he snored away on the sofa, but the rest of us had a great time.

We’re spending a good deal of our time with Valentina’s family. After all we don’t see them that often. Sunday was justly one of the few sunny days this Easter, and we went for a walk on the beach at Isola delle Femmine. The wind was strong, though, and we didn’t stay for long.

Today we gambled on decent weather in spite of a forecast of rain, rain and more rain, and we’ve been reasonably lucky. In the morning we left for Segesta, some 75km west of Palermo, where one of the worlds best preserved hellenistic temples stand, near the ruins of the ancient Elymian city of Segesta. We were fortunate enough to have some nice long spells of sunshine,and we took our time to explore the ruins.

From Segesta we went to visit some very dear friends in Castellammare del Golfo. I’ve known Mariangela and Paolo since before I started to learn Italian some 15+ years ago, and a visit to Sicily without dropping by in Castellammare del Golfo is just not right.

Mariangela and Paolo took us to Balata di Baida to taste a local delicacy, the cassatelle. They are little half moon shaped cakes, filled with ricotta cream, deep fried, and covered in fine sugar. Our short excursion for the sake of a cake became a two hour meandering through the landscape of western Sicily, between fields of durum wheat, beans, vineyards, olive groves and citrus orchards, with a multitude of houses in between, large and small, old and new, beautiful and ugly, abandoned or well kept.

Tuesday is meant to be our final day in Sicily for this time, and we have a bit of shopping to do before we move on. We do not know, however, if the ferry will depart tomorrow evening as scheduled. The wind will be at its strongest tonight, up to 35 knots, so the ferry might not be able to depart from Trapani in time, it might not even be able to arrive there, or even to leave Cagliari tonight. We’ll have to call the shipping line tomorrow for news.

There are more photos from Sicily on Flickr.

We’re in Palermo now. The journey went smoothly and we’re fine.

For some reason flight is the opposite of most other commodities, in that the less you pay the more you get. Our itinerary took us therefore first from Copenhagen to London, Stanstead, where we had to collect our luggage as our two flights weren’t connected. We then had a two hour wait before the check-in for the London-Palermo flight opened, which we spend in a slightly italianised Café Alba with the slogan “Vivere con gusto”. Time passed as we tried.

We checked in and boarded a completely crowded plane with a screaming yellow interior, where I incredibly managed to half sleep half the way.

After another three hours flight we approached the airport of Palermo in the dark, the plane swaying left and right due to the strong gusts of wind. Nevertheless, the descent went well, until we were about 10m above the runway, when the plane just seem to smash down into ground with a huge bang. People gasped and screamed, but the landing gear withstood the impact and we swayed on as we drove down the runway towards the terminal building.

When we finally stopped in front of the terminal, we were told to board some shuttle busses waiting for us. I was a bit surprised, as we were just in front of the terminal, but they’ve been changing at lot lately at Palermo airport, so we boarded the busses and waited patiently for them to fill up. Then, the busses started, drove 30m forwards, turned slightly to the right, continued for another 20m and stopped in front of the terminal, maybe 15m from the nose of the plane.

Our bags were there.

A few days ago I went for a walk here in Palermo, and I took some photos along the way. The road was from Piazza Don Bosco towards Piazza Noce and back.
A funny bending fence

A nice calm sidewalk without parked cars

This is where mafiosi shot down Cesare Terranova and his driver Lenin Mancuso in 1979. It is just in front of a public school.

This is one of the major roads in Palermo, the Via Autonomia Siciliana.

The Via Autonomia Sicilia was supposed to intersect the Via della Libertà here, but unfortunately this Art Nouveau house was in the way, and it still is.

Via della Libertà was once lined with beautiful Art Nouveau villas, but now only a handful survives between the concrete buildings.

Creative parking on the Via della Libertà. That’s what side walks are for, right?

In 1980 the president of the Autonomous Region of Sicily, Piersanto Mattarella, was shot down in front of his home on the Via della Libertà. A hard to see plaque commemorates the victim.

Relatives of his still seem to live in the house.

When a city has garbage containers standing along the main road, it can just as well make a statement of it.

This road is named after one of the old Sicilian princes, the upper caste of the aristocracy. His title was Duca della Verdura, literally Duke of Vegetables. He was probably powerful enough that people wouldn’t laugh.

Persons in wheel chairs often have a hard time in Palermo. The rods are there to keep cars and scooters out, but they also keep others out as well.

This is where judge Giovanni Falcone lived on Via Notarbartolo. Falcone was kill with a massive bomb in 1992. The tree in front of his appartment has become a monument to him.

These are some of the notes people place on the tree. The policeman is one of his bodyguards. They were also killed in the blast.

Parking is a huge problem in Palermo. When somebody can’t find a spot to park they might just leave it parked on the road. The Italians call it double parking.

This was my first stop. Bar Stancampiano in Via Notarbartolo near the train station is the best icecream place in Palermo. You haven’t tasted icecream unleass you’ve tried Stancampiano’s.

Stancampiano inside. I had amarena and stracciatella.

They have christmas too in Palermo. Buy your decorations here.

This must be one of the narrowest sidewalks in the world.

Bar Recupero in Via Malaspina is also a good icecream place.

Most of Palermo is now concrete buildings, but there are still some nice old houses around, like this in Via Malaspina.

On my way back I passed the Giardino Inglese, the English Garden, where Via della Libertà and Via Duca della Verdure intersect. On one side of the garden is the street where the Prefect of Palermo, Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa and his wife were murdered by mafiosi in the 1980s. The street now bears his name. On the other side of the park is a small plaque remembering an innocent high school student who was killed when the driver of the car of some of Giovanni Falcone’s bodyguard lost control of the car when driving at high speed down the Via della Libertà.

When traffic is bad in Palermo, it is bad. Most drivers will use the horn more that the speeder. When I’m here in Palermo on holiday the sound of horns at the nearby road intersection is usually what wakes me up

Italian shops are often called something ending in “-eria”. A bookshop is a libreria, from libro which means book. A pizzeria makes and sell pizze (plural of pizza), a gelateria sells gelato, icecream, and so on. An osteria sells hospitality, literally a “hostery” like in “host”

Since the scheme is very simple, it is very easy to create new words this way, words that are immediately understandable, though missing in most dictionaries.

Here are a few of the ones I have stumbled upon lately.

A yogurteria probably sells youghurt icecream, since it is also a gelateria. It is also a creperia from the French “crepe”, pancake. Seen in Alghero, Sardinia.

A drinkeria sells drinks. It is a bar, after all. They also sell sandwiches, as it is also a panineria In Palermo, Sicily.

The word pantofole means slippers, so a pantofoleria is probably a shop specialised in slippers. Palermo, Sicily.

Cous-cous is not only eaten in North Africa, it is also considered native to Western Sicily. Hence one should not be surprised to find a cous cousseria in Palermo, Sicily.