Jethro Tull

Jethro Tull released their first album in 1968, in the 41 years since they have made a total of 21 studio albums. They are still touring and I went to see them at the Teatro Greco in Taormina. James and I have been talking about going to this show for a long time. 41 years is a long time for a Rock and Roll band but we saw them perform in a theater that has been around for 2200 years. In addition to being used for performances for a couple of millennia, the theater also overlooks the Ionian Sea and has views of Mt. Etna. They rocked and the show was fun.

Tony and Sara

Tony and Sara are our good friends from DC and they came to visit us over Forth of July weekend. They told us they were in the mood for some good food and relaxation. They came to the right place. On the evening of their arrival we caught up over some appetizers and prosecco on our terrace. Later we headed down the hill for some of the town’s greatest pizza and a tour of our favorite watering holes.
During the weekend we took them to Isola Bella beach near Taormina to catch some rays on the Ionian coast. We also took them up onto the mountain for a wine tour and tasting. The wineries up there offer great views of the Sicilian landscape across to the sea. They also got to see Catania at night when we went out to dinner with a group of friends.
Shannon and I had a great time during their visit. It was great to catch up with some good friends and show them some of the great things about living in Sicily.

Pesce Spada Festival

It is not uncommon for Shannon and I to stop at our favorite fish store on the way home from the base and pick up some swordfish steaks. At the pescaria they have a whole swordfish, sometimes longer than I am tall, lying on the table. Shannon tells the old how many kilos she wants cut into how many steaks at a certain thickness. Then the old man takes his cleaver and expertly hacks the order off the fish, right before your eyes. How else are you going to know it’s fresh?
Sicilians believe their waters have the tastiest swordfish in the world. People have been fishing these waters for pesce spada, as they call it, for thousands of years. In Aci Trezza, where we live, they celebrate their patron saint, Saint John the Baptist, with the Pesce Spada festival. The festival includes processions with bands, religious statues and artifacts but people come from all around for the “U Pisci a Mari.”
The U Pisci a Mari is a ritual where fishermen go through the motions of fishing for the pesce spada. They dress up in costumes and come out in a brightly painted boat (they still use these boats every day) and go through the act of hunting for a pesce spada. In this ritual a man slips into the water from the pier and plays the part of the fish. As the men in the boat search for a fish people in the crowd are yelling to the men trying to aid in the hunt. When at last the fish is spotted the men spear at the fish with their harpoons. It is eventually skewered and they haul the fish (man) on to the boat and proceed to take a fake cleaver and hack at the fish. It is a gory scene because they use a lot of fake blood and there is a lot of hacking and sawing. Somehow the fish escapes and they repeat the scene over again only the next time the fish is caught the fish capsizes the boat and swims away forever. The ritual is meant to symbolize man's eternal struggle against nature for survival.
We took a video of the fish on the boat. To view the 1 minute video click the picture below.

Savoca

The Godfather movie partially takes place in Sicily, it is set in the town of Corleone which is located on the west side of the island. To film the movie they actually came to Sicily however they shot the scenes at a town called Savoca which is on the east side of the island. You would expect a town associated with such a famous movie would be a tourist trap but in fact you could spend the whole day there and never know it was famous for anything. It is located on the top of a mountain and has great views of the surrounding country. You would never know it from the movie but if they would have turned the camera around they would have been looking at the Ionian Sea. We found the exact café where Michael Corleone first meets Apollonia’s father and sat in the same spot as Michael and his bodyguards. The bar has not changed.












We also saw the church where Michael gets married and the piazza where the wedding reception takes place. Even without these sites, it is a nice place to visit.









After Savoca we headed down to Isola Bella beach. Isola Bella means Beautiful Island and the name refers to a nature preserve island that is used as a beach. The island is located in a bay and connected to the mainland by a thin stretch of sand. It is one of the most beautiful beaches in Sicily.

Trapani

Shannon and I live on the east side of Sicily and we try to get out and around as much as we can. The west side of the island is very nice too and although only 3 hours away, it makes for a long day trip. As a result, we planned an overnight trip to the west side of the island with our friend Jodi. Our first stop was in Segesta, an ancient Greek city from 700BC. The site has a huge temple and you are permitted to walk around the columns. The temple is said to be the best preserved example of Doric Architecture in the world. From their you take a hike up the hill to the ancient city and take in the views of the surrounding mountains and the Castellammare del Golfo. There is also a Greek theater where Greek tragedies are still preformed in the summer.









From Segesta we headed over to the port town of Marsala. The town is famous for its wine so we stopped in an enoteca to have some lunch and to try some local flavors.









After lunch we headed north to the salt fields between Marsala and Trapani. Sicilians claim that Trapani makes the best salt in the world. Sea salt is still produced here largely the same way it was done 2700 years ago when the Phoenicians brought the techniques to the island. They let seawater into fields and wait for it to evaporate. When all that remains is the salt, they collect it with shovels and wheelbarrows and keep it in piles. To add to the scene there are antique windmills that were used to pump the water. While in the area we went to the Salt Museum and took a ferry to Mozia where there are the ruins of an ancient Phoenician town.
That night we stayed in Erice. Erice is a medieval town located on the top of a mountain. We checked into a hotel and enjoyed a nice dinner. Erice was a nice quiet town and it has streets that are much too small for cars. The next morning we bought tickets that would get us into seven churches around the town. We took in the amazing views from on top of the mountain and visited all the churches.









Erice is famous because it has its own style of ceramics but also they are renowned for their pastries. So I had to go shopping but I was rewarded later with some pie.

Next we drove east to the Zingaro Reserve. The Rieserva Naturalle dello Zingaro is an amazing place. It is at the edge of a mountain chain and is along the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea.

There are no roads inside the park so we went for a hike to enjoy the views. After a hot walk we stopped at one of the beaches along the sea and spent a few hours swimming and getting some sun. We jammed a lot into a two day trip and had a great time. There is a lot to see in Sicily.

Cava Grande

On an already hot day Shannon and I decided to hike Cava Grande in the Syracuse province. Cava Grande is a limestone canyon carved out of the Monti Iblei Plain by the Cassabile river. Cava Grande actually translates to Grand Canyon but the name is the only thing the two gorges really share- You could fit many many Cava Grandes in the Grand Canyon of Arizona. Perhaps only the temperatures compare. We hiked all the way down to the river enjoying the views as we went. The hiking is precarious in only a few places, but like the Grand Canyon there is also a possibility of heat exhaustion. The park service is watchful of hikers, you have to sign in before you take the trail down and get a pass. Along the trail you see a number of marked helipads that are used to evacuate hikers and they have park rangers along the way in case of emergencies. At the bottom we followed the Cassabile river for about a half-hour and chose a pool of water to take a dip in and cool down. The majority of the hike was spent going down and back up.

Aunt MaryBeth

Shannon’s Aunt Marybeth came to visit us in Sicily. She was traveling through Europe with a friend and they made Sicily a part of their trip. We showed them around and did our best to ensure they got the most out of their time here. We all went up to Taormina on Friday and they got to see the Greek Theater and

take a look around one of Sicily’s nicest cities.
On Saturday Shannon took them to the Tornabene family home in Gangi.

Wanda Tornabene and her mother Giovanna write very famous Sicilian cookbooks and they also open their home to cooking lessons. The drive took the ladies through the gorgeous Madonie Mountains which offer some great views and some precarious driving. They even had to stop once because of a herd of cows in the road. During their lesson they cooked an entire Sicilian meal with a number of courses and of course at the end they got to eat the fruits of their labor.
On Sunday we took them into Catania to show them around the city and look at the Duomo. Afterwards we headed south along the Ionian Sea to Syracuse to see the historical sites and walk around the city. We visited the Archeological park and took a crypt tour along with visiting the Temple of Apollo.
That night Shannon made some Sicilian food and we all ate it out on our porch overlooking the Aci Trezza harbor.
We kept them pretty busy here, but I think we all had a lot of fun.