Italy with Kids - Taormina

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29 Sept 2008 (these blogs being uploaded from Letojanni -have to do pics later)

Another sunny day awaits us: breakfast was excellent. The residence provided fresh croissants, normal cornflakes, chocolate cornflakes, coffees, fruit juice and jams. I imagine the jam was for toast, but didn't see anyone having toast. We asked for bowls for the cornflakes (you can guess what flavour the boys chose), but apparently there were no bowls. The idea was to fill a plastic cup - like a glass - with the cornflakes, add milk, and eat with a spoon. The boys liked this as it meant they were left with chocolate milk to drink after eating the cornflakes.

Ky went for a run down the hill - yes down only! She walked back up. Suggested later that she may run down to Letojanni and then catch the shuttle back up - talk about going soft!

We then drove off to Taormina. Unexpectedly this turned out to be the buildings we'd been looking at from our balcony, so the drive was nice and short. A decent sized carpark is at the bottom of the Funivia (cablecar) which we'd reached by simply driving along the SS114. After parking someone drove past and offered us their parking ticket, which saved us €6. Then a short walk down to the little bay of Mazzaro. Like the Letojanni beach, this one was also stony but with smaller granules which again punished our feet. Joseph and I rented snorkel kits for €10 each for the day, and had en excellent time out in the bay and along the rocks. A wonderful mixture of see grasses and large rocks with an assortment of what we might call small reef-fish, including sea urchins, starfish, and a school of garfish.

The water was again not chilly, but cold enough for us to get out after an hour and warm up in the sun. We then walked up the steps, along the road and down to the next bay, the Baia Dell Isola Belle. Joseph and I had another snorkel there, where there were enormous rocks under the water that formed canyons and caves with a mixture of sea life around. Isola Belle is very picturesque, but the weather turned cloudy so we packed up after lunch and headed for the Funivia.















Again Joseph was too tall. If he'd been under 1m tall he could have had a free ride on the Funivia, but instead we paid €14 for the three of us, Liam being free. The short ride up to the town of Taormina included a view over their soccer field!

Taormina is a delightful little town. Its main street is pedestrian only, running for close to 1km with all sorts of shops on both sides. Ky and I spotted an amazing impressionist painting which was only €3,000 (one for our
next trip obviously), and then a more acceptably priced ceramic jug in red and green for €21. Liam found a nice blue Mt Etna T-shirt for €8, while Joseph picked up a marvellous blue crystal aggregate also for €8. The stores were also selling small statues made of what looked like lava, but not to our liking. Joseph had his picture taken with a 'statue' street performer.












Oh - one note about our snack stop at the Bar Capriccio: they had an excellent Tiramisu. I was delighted to find that in addition to the wonderful mix of cream and sweetness the cake-part of the slice seemed to melt in my mouth.

We'd located a small grocery shop during our walk, so stocked up on some essentials - we've yet to find a decent sized supermarket, but there must be one somewhere! and then home for pasta shaped like small stars (that Liam found in the grocery shop). Ky and I had a liquer each: Ky a chocolate liquer in her coffee, and I had a side tipple of grappa. As it turned out, a flavourless rocket of a grappa! Tomorrow I'll try the pistacchio flavoured liquer.










Ky and I also finally found examples of walls and a pergola for our front yard at home:

A wall with arches,



and a pergola with a high covering of vines.



.. we may have trouble fitting it all in to our front yard!

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