Martin Fuggle Downunder

We got up at six, had breakfast early and set off for Palermo Airport. We got there in good time to return the car to Hertz but were far too early for the plane to Barcelona. We eventually got the 1.35pm plane and landed at Barcelona at around 3.00pm and took a taxi to the apartment. We had to meet the landlady at 5.00pm and we arrived at around 4.20pm so we had some tapas at a bar in the square where we thought our apartment was. I headed off at 5.00pm to meet the landlady as arranged only to find no-one where I was expecting to meet them. After a few frantic phone calls all worked out well and I went back to join Jenny for the rest of the tapas.
The apartment was OK - clean, well-appointed and in a very convenient location in the Placeta del Pi in the Barri Gottic area of Barcelona. We were on the first floor and looked out over the square below which was full of tables. Underneath us was a bar called the Travel Bar. It seemed a bit of an English home away from home with HP sauce on the tables but the good thing was that they provided free wifi internet access to their customers. Well we weren't a customer but we could get onto their internet since it wasn't locked down so we had free and permanent internet access - quite a bonus that the apartment people didn't tell us about!
The bed was OK but we didn't realise that the Travel Bar below not only provided wifi access but also a lot of noise until around 2.00 to 3.00 in the morning!

It is very cold, windy and raining a lot. Joan had suggested that she would like to give Catherine a small sewing machine that she was no longer able to use. We packed it up and went to the local industrial estate to find someone who could transport it to Melbourne. It cost and absolute fortune and on reflection we could have bought two or three similar sewing machines in Australia for the cost of the freight.

We met Tupp, Pax and Reg at Panini for coffee and then after lunch we drove to Corfe Castle. It was very interesting and we found out a lot about the history of the castle. We stopped off at some National Trust tea rooms for afternoon tea and finally got home at around 6.00 pm.

We went to the local fish and chip shop in Ringwood to get some decent English fish and chips but they were pretty bad. Very limp chips and lots of thick batter all over the haddock.

We decided we would go up the hill to Erice and see what to do after we had a chance to see what the weather was like. In the morning it was raining and misty but there was a chance that it might clear up in the afternoon. We took the car up the hill to Erice and within a few minutes the cloud was so low that we were unable to see more than about 10 meters in front of the car. When we got to the top of the hill it was even worse and we could see very little of the streets in Erice. Nevertheless it was a pretty town and very typical of an Italian hill town on the mainland.
We bought some food at the local store and had a roll in the car before deciding to drive to San Vito lo Capo at the north western tip of Sicily. The weather changed for the better and became quite warm and when we got to San Vito Jenny headed for the beach and had a couple of hours sleeping on the beach and getting a little burnt. I had a gelato brioche and then joined Jenny on the beach. It was a pretty spot and clearly much better that the place we were staying at in Erice Mare.
We went back to the hotel room and had a picnic in the room before starting to pack for the journey to Barcelona. Packing went really well but we had left the window open during the day and the room was filled with mosquitoes. We killed them one by one until their bodies were on the walls, ceiling, mirrors, floor and bench tops. We thought we had them all but there was one that buzzed around all night and caused us a sleepless time. Nevertheless we were able to get up at six ready for the journey to Spain.

The weather is very blustery with strong winds and drizzle - typically English. We all walked into Ringwood and had coffee and 'doorsteps' with bacon at the coffee place in the market square.

In the afternoon we went to pick up the hire car. We had to catch two buses and walk a long way - it took us one and a half hours even though the car hire place was only five miles away.

For the first time since we left Australia we managed to have bacon for breakfast - not bacon as we know it but the sort of bacon that is found underneath silver barrel shaped lids and on bits of toast to soak up the grease in resort hotels all over the world. It was accompanied by scrambled eggs that defy description. So we stuck to the standard breakfast of cereal, yogurt, fruit, fruit juice, salami, ham and cheese, etc., etc. There was a good selection of 'resort people' in white shorts, stripy tops and lots of dangling gold jewellery as well as a group of English women who had had too much sun on their ample bodies and were displaying it with skimpy tops.
We decided to drive down to Marsala and have a look at a the salt pans on the way. Once we managed to find our way out of Trapani we managed to find the Museo di Saline and had a look at the salt pans and an old windmill which was used in the production of the salt (I am not sure how since I couldn't translate the Italian description). We then drove down to Marsala, had a quick look around, had something to eat and then headed back to the hotel where we walked on the beach towards the old windmill at the end of the beach. The beach was absolutely filthy - it seems that the Italians have no feeling for the environment and the beach was littered with plastic bottles, plastic bags and all sorts of other rubbish including bits and pieces of old cars.
We planned to eat at the hotel restaurant but when we went to a table they told us they were booked out and we couldn't eat there. We were pretty annoyed but headed into Trapani and had a meal at Peppe's near to the port. The food was good and recommended in the Sicily Top Ten book. Jenny had a pasta baked in the oven and I had swordfish baked with potato and onion. Both were excellent.
All in all we had a slow day and we are not that enamoured with the hotel and Erice Mare or the surrounding area. Maybe tomorrow when we go to Erice and Segeste we will have a different view.

Martin got up early at 6.30 am and went for a long walk along the River Avon towards Christchurch and back. He was very excited to see tow wild (fallow?) deer.

We decided to take the bus to Bournemouth. We had a great day and visited the Russell Cotes Museum and Art Gallery. The gallery is housed in a magnificent Victoria mansion with Italian and Spanish influences.

We got the bus and arrived home at around 5.00 pm and had kippers for tea!

We said our farewells at Giugiullena and were sad to leave. Sabrina and Lucia had been wonderful and we would recommend the hotel to anyone. It was a little out of the tourist precinct but the ambiance was perfect and Sabrina made it so worthwhile that we would love to spend a few weeks there sometime in the future.
We were facing a long drive via Ragusa, Gela and Agrigento on our way to Trapani and Erice. We finally got on the road at around 9.30am and were hoping to be able to stop off in Agrigento for a couple of hours to see the Valley of the Temples. We lost our way between Noto and Ragusa (how I just don't know) and lost an hour or more so we were a bit pressured to get some kilometres under our belt. From Ragusa we needed to get to Gela and the road was not at all well made. We also encountered a lot of traffic especially in some of the towns along the way. We wanted to stop for something to eat but nothing looked appealing. We got to Gela and it looked awful. We entered the town next to a massive oil refinery and then the main street looked very poor indeed. So we pressed onto Agrigento and found a town called Locata about one third of the way and went into the centre where we had a coffee and panino for around 5.00 euros and it was very good.
We then got back on the road and just drove until we arrived at Erice just past Trapani. Erice is an old town at the top of an enormous rock and we drove up and up and up until we got to the centre of the old town. Given that our hotel was supposed to be on the beach it was a bit surprising to be so high up. We asked some people for directions to our hotel and it turned out that there is a place called Erice Mare. So we went down to sea level and found our hotel in the middle of a very uninteresting place and it was a resort and conference hotel - not exactly the sort of hotel that we really wanted to be in. It was the sort of place that has a massive reception area, over priced restaurants with poor food and lots of flashy people. I expect if we look hard enough it will have a gym and other resort type things. Anyway we are here for three nights and I guess we'll get to like it.
We decided to look for a restaurant where we could eat and found a place just up the road which seemed to be fairly good. We had a look at the menu and decided to eat there after watching Gerry Scott and Chi Vuol Essere Millionario. The food at the restaurant started with an Insalata di Mare. It was fantastic and plenty of it as well. We then had a seafood spaghetti and when it arrived it was sensational. Mine contained large clams and a sauce that was the best spaghetti I have had. It was really superb. The clams were nice and big and the sauce, a base of breadcrumbs with oil and all sorts of stuff to make it very piccanto, was superb. Apart from some wine we had a Limoncello and Jenny got a dose of the giggles which lasted for quite a while. The waiter was most amused and seemed to think that the Limoncello had something to do with it. We slept quite well.

Another beautiful day and we started with breakfast on the balcony in the sun. We went into the centre of Syracuse to see the San Giovanni catacombs, the Archaeological Museum and the Cathedral. The catacombs were most interesting and the archaeological museum contained so many pots, or fragments of pots that it was impossible to obtain a clear view about the chronology and development of pottery. Some of the pots were from the Bronze Age which is pretty early history!
We then went onto see the cathedral in Ortigia. This building is fantastic. It has been built around a Greek Temple to Athena and the original Greek columns have been incorporated into the new church. The columns themselves are massive and it's hard to understand how the ancient Greeks could possibly move the stone into place. The church has been destroyed by earthquakes and rebuilt over time but the Greek columns have survived the various earthquakes that have taken place in the part of the world.
We headed back to the hotel and had a bit of a rest before going back to the same restaurant with Jenny and Brian that we went to the previous night.

We got up and went down for breakfast where the sun was shining in from the east and the breakfast was lovely. We suggested that Jenny and Brian might like to join us on the way to Noto and they seemed pleased to get a lift there. Sabrina mentioned that we should go a little bit past Noto and visit a small tuna fishing port called Marzamemi which she thought was a very pretty spot.
Well we eventually headed off with the other Jenny navigating and my Jenny and Brian in the pack of the car. It didn't take long to get to Noto but trying to find somewhere to park was pretty tough. We walked into the main street and had a coffee before starting to look at the various buildings. The whole place was magnificent and the buildings lining the street were dramatic, clean and many of them being restored. We went into the Town Hall and visited the Room of Mirrors which was quite spectacular. There were two mirrors on opposite walls where you could see an endless set of reflections. The room was used for civil wedding ceremonies and we saw an Italian bride ready for her wedding ceremony.
We also walked down the street and got caught by a fellow with a budgerigar in a little cage and draw of Lotto tickets. If you paid a couple of euros the budgerigar would pick out a ticket. We didn't understand what was going on but the bird picked a ticket at random with numbers pre-selected and you could then go and buy a real ticket and presume that the numbers picked by the budgerigar would be your lucky numbers. Hmmm - we got scammed.
We then looked at one of the museums before stopping for lunch at a bit after 1.00pm. In Sicily, as in the rest of the south of Italy, everything closes between around 1.00pm and 4.00pm so we had nothing to do other than eat. We had an 'aranchini' which is a Sicilian speciality made from rice and various things inside and it's rolled up into a ball that looks like an orange, hence the name. Frankly I wasn't that impressed with it bit it was good enough for lunch.
We went back to the car and drove down the coast to Marzamemi. The countryside was full of olive and orange/lemon trees and looked very orderly. Marzamemi was a very old tuna fishing village and the buildings were very interesting. The water was absolutely crystal clear and very blue. We walked to a large square with some tables outside and then found some shops in the old buildings which had some beautiful things. We bought some fabulous ceramics with colours that were brilliant and beautiful. Jenny and Brian bought some ceramics as well and were planning on donating them to a raffle that they have every year with some friends in the village that they live in.
We left Marzamemi and drove back to Syracuse very satisfied with the day's activity. All of our stuff was moved into our new room when we got back and it was stunningly beautiful. We decided to eat at the restaurant just up the street and were reticent to ask Jenny and Brian in case they wanted some time to themselves after spending the day together. They had the same concern but coincidentally turned up at the same restaurant and we joined each other for the evening meal. The food was very good and much of the menu was written in Sicilian dialect. For the first time since I had been in Italy we had a buffet antipasto and there selection of foods was superb - lots of fish and many Sicilian specialities.

We got up early, packed our cases and went down for breakfast. I spoke to Melissa on reception and she reduced the bill a little because of the air conditioning problem and arranged a lift for us down to the port so that we could get the ferry back to Milazzo. Just as well we left plenty of time to get the 10.10am ferry because in fact it went at 9.15am. So we just caught it with a few minutes to spare, found the car still in the same spot that we left it and headed off to Siracusa bypassing Messina, Taormina and Catania.
We stopped to fill up with petrol and food (a panino and coffee) and finally got to Syracuse in the early afternoon and had quite a bit of trouble finding the hotel. When we finally got there it was absolutely lovely. A charming woman called Sabrina met us and we sat down in a fabulous room which had windows looking out to the sea on three sides of the room and the furnishings were very tasteful. We slumped into the couches and Sabrina made us a coffee and brought us a piece of beautiful Sicilian cake with strawberries on the top. It was great. Some people from England returned from a day out, sat down and joined us for afternoon tea. They were called Jenny and Brian and came from a small village in England not far from Stratford on Avon. They knew where we used to live in Wellesbourne. They plan to go to Noto tomorrow and Sabrina is going to drive them to the bus but we thought that we would probably go to Noto so we might as well do it on the same day and drive Jenny and Brian with us.
Sabrina asked if we would be prepared to stay in a room on the top floor terrace because she had a prominent actor staying with her for a month and he had asked that she didn't move him out of his room. She asked if we would take the top floor terrace and then move another room for the next two days. She didn't charge us for the first night and it really wasn't a big problem for us although it would have been nice to be in the next room for the whole three nights. We semi unpacked and decided to eat at a place in Ortigia where Jenny and Brian had eaten earlier. It was off the tourist track and seemed to be the province of the locals. We had a wonderful antipasto which we shared and then had spigola (sea bass) fried inside grated potato - it was superb. We headed home and went to bed very satisfied with the whole ambience of the Hotel Giugiullena.