6 May 2008 Maria, one of our campsite hosts arrived early at 7.40 to take us to the train. We were surprised that our tickets to Siracusa had to be bought at a bar. Arriving at the station, we learnt that a bus would have to be taken because of engineering works. From the station we made our way to Ortygia, andn island on which old Siracusa and mercifully survived the bombing of WW2. Our first port of call was the main Piazza where we indulged in a coffee a chocolate croissant before visiting the Duomo. This cathedral started life as the Temple of Athene built in the 5th century BC. In the 7th century it was incorporated into an early Christian church. The Normans made eight arches into the cella walls to create a nave. ... read more

4 May 2008 After a peaceful night we to a beautiful bright morning. We had to wait for the Villa Romana del Casale to open but Wendy passed the time talking to a French couple who had recently bought a campervan. The visit to the villa was both amazing and enthralling. It was a privilege to be able to see a huge building from Roman times richly decorated with so many beautiful floor mosaics. Sadly a mojor restoration programme is underway and we were only able to see about 50% of the areas and those that were available were rather spoilt by the building works. From the pictures in our guide book we guessed we missed some of the best mosaics. We headed south east through hill towns and rolling countryside back to the coast. The ... read more

2 May 2008 In the morning we looked around the Greek Temples and Acopolis at Selinute, very close to where we were staying. This was followed by a 100k drive eastwards to Agrigento where there is yet another Greek site to see. But that’s for tomorrow after which we will probably be templed out. ... read more

30 April 2008 We woke to the hottest day yet and decided to head inland to see a virtually complete but unfinished Greek Temple - rough unfluted columns and undecorated capitals - at Segesta. The position was inspiring and the temple magnificent. Given the temperature, we made use of the coach to take us up to the summit of another hill where the star attraction was a Greek limestone amphitheatre with stunning views over the surrounding countryside. We walked back down through an amazing variety of wild flowers, carpets of orange, purple, blue and yellow with the odd touch of white. After a very late lunch we headed for Trapani in order to take the telecabine, strange without skis, up to the ancient city of Erice. It was occupied by many different civilizations including the Greeks, ... read more

28 April 2008 We had a long but as usual enjoyable day exploring Palermo, the capital of Sicily. The morning was spent looking around churches, back streets, markets, city gates, the cathedral and theatres. The city is built in the shadow of 609 m high Monte Pellegrino and in the afternoon we took an exciting bus ride to the Santuario di Santa Rosalila on the mountain. We walked from there to the summit but were disappointed when we got there as its covered in radio and mobile telephone masts. When we returned to the Santuario we got mixed up with our second wedding of the trip. After taking the bus back to Palermo, updating the blog and then riding the two buses needed to get us back to Sferracavallo until after eight. We went straight to ... read more