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| Back street in Taormina, Sicily |
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| Main Thoroughfare in Taormina, Sicily |
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| Sunday Morning in a Taormina Cafe, still empty, the waiter is playing Bach on an upright piano, without sheet music but with comsummate skill and mastery. |
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| How much is this doggie in the window... dogs seem to be employees of choice in most stores and welcome shoppers |
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| Mama Cristina in her corner bakery rolling arincinis... |
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| Her son loading the ovens and stacking the display counter |
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| The Godfather on a beer label |
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| The artist in his open air gallery in Taormina |
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| Piazza de Duomo in Catania |
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| Iconic Elephant fountain in the city square of Catania |
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| Silvester Stallone and his helpers making offers one cannot refuse.... |
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| This is the Sicilian way to serve a simple glass of wine.... |
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| Under all the layers and layers of lava upon which the city has been rebuilt numerous times, flows a river. It makes it's appearance on side of the town's square, emerging from who knows underground in full force. A fountain with marble statues marks the spot. |
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| Baing a Sunday, all fishermen are at home and enjoy a Sicilian Sunday family dinner - a traditional and huge event |
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| The view from the aft deck of Prinsendam towards Catania and Mount Aetna in the background. |
And a little bit of background to the photos....
At Sea off the west coast of Italy's coast, slamming through one of the dreaded Mediterranean gales. Over 40 knot winds, high lumpy seas - never nice even swells here - and a bit of 'pile driving' going on when a particularly big wave mountain explodes over the bow of the ship and she crashes noisily back down with a bone shaking shudder.
At Sea off the west coast of Italy's coast, slamming through one of the dreaded Mediterranean gales. Over 40 knot winds, high lumpy seas - never nice even swells here - and a bit of 'pile driving' going on when a particularly big wave mountain explodes over the bow of the ship and she crashes noisily back down with a bone shaking shudder.
Ship speed is down to 7 knots to lessen the impact of the sea, however, we bounce around quite a bit anyway. The captain changes his course to take the confused waves from the least unpleasant angle...but, one hangs on for dear life.
Confronted with this unfavourable sea state, the prognosis for anchoring of Sorrento look somewhat doubtful in my opinion. No official announcement of change of itinerary from the Bridge - yet - but, it may be Naples or another port with available docking space instead of Sorrento. Sorrento is a tender port, and NOBODY would be able to step from an anchored ship onto a tender in these confused and violent seas 10 meter or so high...if she would be able to anchor at all.
Actually Catania, which we just left, is also a 'replacement' Port on this journey, as a landing in Tunisia after the unrest of late was not advisable, so the Port of Sousse in Tunisia was replaced by Catania in Sicily.
Another old city, second largest in Sicily after Palermo, Catania has been covered by dozens of lava flows from nearby Mount Aetna during the passage of centuries, she has been shaken and destroyed by earthquakes, and bombed during the Second World War. Catanians have learned how to rebuild and rebuild again. In the centre of the City, way below present day street level, part of the ruins of a greco/roman amphitheathre have been unearthed (from layers and layers of volcanic rock) and underground passages are labyrinthic and almost totally unexplored. Too complicated, too dangerous because of trapped gases...
The most memorable eruption happened in 1663, when a mile wide stream of lave swallowed most of the slopes and the town. Not quite rebuilt 30 years later, an earthquake destroyed the half rebuilt city again - start all over again.
A relic of St Agatha narrowly diverted another deadly lave flow, now she is the city's patron saint, and a 5 day party and fiesta in her honour commemorates the event.
Catania's claim to fame is threefold: Composer Vincenzo Bellini lived here, a fountain topped by an elephant carved from Lava Rock graces the center of the city square. The pachiderm carries a granite Egyptian obelisk. Then there is Piazza de Duomo, said to be the prettiest town square in Sicily.
It's other less advertised claim to fame seems to be petty crime, even one of our passengers was robbed walking to town.
Before I knew of that little incident, I strolled around Catania after a short jaunt to Taormina (a short bus ride away) and explored the plaza. I abandoned one route to get back to the ship, as my skin started to crawl when entering a seedy looking part of that area. Never ignoring skin crawls in strange cities, I made a 180 degree turn and returned to the ship via a different route without seeing anything or anybody looking remotely dangerous.
Near by hill town of Taormina proved to be as pleasant and sunny and delightful as ever. I completed the obligatory paseo (walk) through it's quaint and cozy streets, alleys and staircases before visiting La Cristina, a corner bakery highly praised by locals, and too drab looking to attract tourists.
Cristina, the matriarch of the family, was rolling Arincinis (little goody filled crispy pizza dough balls) right there, her son was baking pizzas and other local delights, the daughter was at the cash register and another one was filling orders. No chairs in sight, but all the freshly baked goods in plain view emitting seductive aromas. 4 Euros bought me a most scrumptious still oven warm Arincini filled with various local cheeses, pistachios, prociutto as well as a Birra Moretti (beer) with a fedora hatted Mafioso on the label.
How more Sicilian could it get?
Weather was ideal, which can no longer be said about present conditions. But - all part of being at sea.
