Sicily part #1


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October 17th 2009
Published: October 17th 2009
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TUESDAY 13 OCTOBER - PALERMO, SICILY

Having checked into a hostel a 10 minute walk from Victoria Station yesterday, my alarm was still set at the ridiculously early time of 3:15am. It was amusing waking most of my room when I got out of bed to shower and pack. About three or four of them had gotten in (quite drunk and therefore noisily) at about 2:30am!! I did feel sorry though for the girl with the bunk above mine - she had been crying earlier having just been fired from her au pair job (she was more upset as she didn’t know why when she had only been there for a fortnight on a part-time basis and the family had only been around for a week of that time!!).

My flight was at 6:20am from Gatwick, so I had planned to get the 4am Gatwick express from Victoria, leaving me more than enough time to get to check in well in advance. For some reason though - when I got there at 3:45am, the next train wasn’t until 4:30am. Turned out that that was ok - I got to the airport at 5am, had time to get through security, grab breakfast and use the bathrooms before the flight was being called. I slept pretty much the entire way to Palermo, Sicily (Italy). The flight even arrived early just before 10am.

Took a while to get through passport control as I had to join the ‘other passports’ line. Got another entry stamp. Collected my baggage and even managed to find the airport shuttle ok - although I then sat in the bed for half an hour until it decided to leave. Was about a 50 minute trip into the central train station, then a 10-15 minute walk to where I was supposed to be saying.

So I found it relatively easily, climbed the stairs to discover that no one was answering the door. So I sat for about 15 minutes and rang the bell again. I then proceeded to ring the bell about every five minutes or so - as well as to ring the contact number I had. At about 12:30am, an hour after I arrived - I gave up. The phone kept saying no one was available and the place looked pretty deserted. I didn’t fancy wasting the rest of my day, so I slipped a rather nasty note through their door and left to find an internet café - which thankfully was only about two doors down. I followed up my note with an equally nasty email saying I demanded a refund of my deposit and that I was going to write a terrible review on hostel world, sent hostel world an email to find out how I could go about getting a refund of my deposit, and found another hostel, rang them and confirmed availability. It was about another 10 minute walk from where I was - so headed there and was thankfully able to check in for two nights straight away.

After locking some valuables up in my locker, I headed out to see a bit of the city. Sicily has been occupied by dozens of invading armies over thousands of years - and it shows in the architecture and the people - quite distinct from how I remember the rest of Italy.

My first impressions of Palermo was that it reminded me of Vietnamese cities. That might sound a little strange - but walking around - the traffic is chaotic with seemingly very little road rules; crossing roads can be quite an experience as traffic won’t really stop even where there is a red light, there are plenty of scooters and motorcycles, everyone parks wherever they can find a place (even if that means blocking someone else in or parking on a footpath nearly running down the passengers walking on it!) and the city is also quite dirty - with quite a lot of litter on the streets (despite seeing lots of street cleaners!!).

The main intersection of Quattro Canti (Four Corners) is where the four city districts converge. On each corner there is a building decorated with baroque sculptures which were commissioned when Palermo was under Spain’s control. Nearby is the town hall (Palazzo del Municipio) and several other churchs - La Martorana and Chiesa di Cataldo).

From there I wandered up to Teatro Massimo - which is a symbol of triumph and tragedy of Palermo and where the closing scene of the Godfather III was filmed. I saw the Palazzo Reale - which is now the seat of Sicilian Parliament and Teatro Politeama. Also passed one of the markets which was closing up for the day.

I then managed to stumble across quite a large supermarket and buy some food for a late lunch and stuff for dinner for the next few nights.

At about 4pm or so, having had enough walking and being exhausted from my early start, I bought a 24 ticket for the hop on hop off city sightseeing bus service and did the two routes, finishing at around 6pm. While it went past a lot of the sights I had already seen wandering around, it also pointed out some that I hadn’t seen and gave me a bit more history and information on the ones I had seen - that my guidebook hadn’t provided.

Headed back to the hostel which was still quite deserted with no one in my room, no one on the terrace and no one in the common room or kitchen. Chopped up and cooked some veges and pasta, added sauce and ate dinner on the terrace as the sun set before heading downstairs and using the internet. By the time I headed to my room a few hours later there was still no one in the other beds. The street outside was quite noisy so I popped in my ear plugs, locked the door and went to sleep.

WEDNESDAY 14 OCTOBER 2009 - PALERMO, SICILY

I woke up this morning to find that I was still alone in the dorm room. Went up to the kitchen and made myself a toasted sandwich using my toastie bag in a fry pan (best thing I have ever bought - you stick your sandwich in it, then you can pop it into the toaster - and you have a toastie. Without a toaster I have discovered it works equally as well in a frying pan though!). Still didn’t see anyone, although there were traces of other people around - namely being a mess in the kitchen and dirty dishes. I don’t know how people can use hostel kitchens and not clean up after themselves - it is just rude. Rant over.

Just after 9am I headed towards the four corners again and then north. I had a detour and a look around the cathedral - which on the outside was enormous and quite odd - in that the domes didn’t quite seem to fit with the rest of the décor.

From there I continued to head up north, pausing again at Palazzo Reale. It was here that I got slightly lost as my map, and the directions in the Lonely Planet, were pretty shit. According to LP, the Catacombes where I was heading were 250 metres up Vittorio Emanuele. So that’s the way I walked. After about 25-30 minutes it became clear that wasn’t the right way, so I decided to turn back. When I got back to Palazzo Reale I decided to consult the city sightseeing bus map to see where I could catch that from, and discovered the Catacombs were marked on that - and that I had to veer off to the right. So I backtracked again slightly and eventually stumbled across the Piazza Cappucini Catacombes. The reason I wanted to go here was that Lonely Planet has described it as about the coolest place in the world. And it certainly didn’t fail to amaze me.

Essentially it is an underground catacomb filled with skeletal remains and mummified bodies. And I’m not talking about 20 or 30 of them. There were hundreds. Most of them date back to the late 1800s if the tags on them were anything to go by. Apparently some of the bodies are preserved with arsenic or lime, others by ‘straining the body dry and then preserving it in vinegar. On some it is still possible to see hair and the remains of what I can only assume was skin. They are all ‘dressed’ and many have their clothes stuffed with straw to look ‘realistic.’ Some mummies hang on the walls - others lie down in ‘coffins’ on display. There were even some babies - presumably everyone in there had died of natural causes but since there wasn’t really any explanations anywhere you sort of have to assume these things!!

Once I had had a very morbid look around I had a brief wander through the cemetery outside before grabbing a cold drink and back tracking my steps back to the Quattro Qanti where I re-joined the sightseeing bus. This time I got out briefly at the station to check train times for tomorrow and then at Palazzo Steri for a quick look at the harbour area. Back to Teatro Politeama I grabbed lunch and found a book shop which had a clean (free) toilet and joined the blue line. Again I hopped off briefly at Castello della Zisa, before joining the next bus and returning to the city centre.

Since by this time it was very late in the afternoon I headed slowly back to the hostel, just in time as it started to rain. It had been my intention to go out once it got dark, but after cooking dinner (pasta with veg) it started to pour so I headed to bed. Had a roommate tonight who I never met, was asleep when I walked in after using internet downstairs.

THURSDAY 15 OCTOBER 2009 - AGRIGENTO

As I had slept with ear plugs again, I didn’t hear my roommate leave in the early hours and when I got up before 8:30am they were already gone.

After breakfast (toastie) I packed my bags and headed down to the train station to catch the 10:35am train to Agrigento. As it was raining pretty steadily all the usual ‘vendors’ were out attacking the tourists trying to sell umbrellas - which I had thankfully decided to put into my bag at the last minute.

The train arrived just before 1pm and after managing to buy a bus ticket without any real problems I got the number 2 bus out to the camping ground where I had booked a ‘dorm’ room for the evening. Just as I thought I had missed my stop, we passed the camping ground and I jumped off. Was able to check into my cabin/ dorm room straight away and given that I was quite wet (although at least I got to use all my waterproof stuff - including backpack cover) it was good to be able to get changed into some dry clothes.

Straight away the camping ground reminded me of being back on the Top Deck tour again. Essentially the ‘dorm’ room was a cabin that the camping ground rented beds in on an individual basis rather than having to let the entire cabin. Guess they saw a market for that as there isn’t much else in the way of budget accommodation in town. Needless to say it was pretty basis, four beds in two ‘rooms’ but it did have a fridge. Unfortunately there was no kitchen and no wifi.

After waiting for the rain to subside slightly I headed back into Agrigento on the local bus to have a look around. The main reason I had come here was for the temples, but I decided to wait until tomorrow when I could dedicate a whole day - to do that.

There wasn’t a whole lot to see and do in Agrigento to be honest - and after wandering around for two hours past various churches, down some cute little narrow backstreets and some nice squares/ piazzas, I decided to call it a very early day. It was still drizzling, although not as much as previously and the sun was starting to try to come out. Hardly anyone was in town though as everything seems to close down for a couple of hours in the middle of the day. Not sure if this is the Spanish influence as well, or Italian, but I think they all go for little siestas. It meant that despite the fact that I was in the main shopping area that everything was closed. I found one little café open where I could grab a sandwich but no much else.

Headed back to the campsite late in the afternoon, stopping at the nearby market to grab some food for the next two days. When I got back to the campsite I still had no room mates but I did discover a kitten hanging around which followed me in and didn’t really leave for the rest of the night. It even had some dinner with me (salad tortillas with mayo).

It got quite cold at night so I headed to bed pretty early as there was really nothing else to do and still no one around.

FRIDAY 16 OCTOBER 2009 - AGRIGENTO

Woke up this morning when the sun started shining in directly under the door. No room mates had appeared in the night and when I showered I didn’t see anyone else around. Extra couple of cats had showed up this morning though.

I ate some breakfast (rice cakes with vegemite and some orange juice) before getting the local bus out to the Valley of the Temples (ie/ the actual reason I came to Agrigento!). It is one of the major Greek archaeological sites in the world. In the 50th Olympiad (somewhere around 500BC) there was an ancient Greek town called Agrakas founded here. The valley is essentially a ridge below town with five Greek temples - while you can see them from the road, you can also pay to wander around and have a closer look. They were split into two halves by the road that runs through the area.

The only one which is basically intact is the Tempio della Concordia which was built in around 400BC. From Tempio di Giunone (Juno Temple) I got a great view out over the other temples. I wandered around with the audio guide for a good couple of hours - although I bareloy used the audio guide as I couldn’t see numbers to work out which button to press and I lost my map mid way. I tried my hardest to avoid all of the tour groups that were traipsing through the area - they started arriving from about 11:30am in bulk - so I was glad I got there at around 10am or so!! The temples themselves though were quite impressive, and the weather (sunny but not really hot) was just perfect to wander around having a look and enjoying the sunshine. A lot of the temples only had a few pillars remaining, having had the stone stolen over previous years to build other structures. Some of the temples now lie completely in ruins. It surprised me though, as I remember being surprised in Greece all those years ago, that they don’t mind you walking and climbing over ancient ruins. I mean, some were fenced off, but for the most part, there was no restriction with climbing up on rocks and having a closer look. I guess if they have been standing since 500BC, then there is a fair chance that people walking all over them isn’t going to do too much damage?? Who knows.

After about three hours I decided to head up the road to the Archaeological Museum where I wandered around through the relics. It was a very well done museum, but after reading quite a few of the panels (they had plenty of information in Eglish), I was ready to call it a day. And so, at about 3pm or so I headed back to the camping ground. Still no one around except more cats.

I used the internet briefly, went for a walk, then read for the remainder of the afternoon. Had some more salad and tortilla wraps for dinner. A New Zealand guy showed up in the ‘dorm’ cabin next door and gave me some advice on Catania and Syracuse as he had just come from there, and then I headed to bed. Again it was a very cold night!!


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22nd October 2009

Sicily
Hi! Sounds like a blast of a trip. We are headed to Sicily on the 20th of November. PLEASE post more on this blog. Your experiences and information are great! Look forward to hearing more soon. We are taking notes. Thanks! The Hawleys (Benton, Kansas)

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