Etna - Up, Up & Away!
And yes, that is Mt. Etna in all its glory . . . smoking & spitting!!
We leave the beautiful city of Taormina for our next stop – 3 days in Puntaluzza – Region of Catania. Now, if you know anything about Catania – it’s actually one of the newest & most modern cities of Sicily . . . wait for it . . . because it’s been destroyed by Mt. Etna’s eruptions over the centuries and has had to be rebuilt so many times!
We’ve chosen an Agritourism site called La Pietra Antica O’Munti – and it’s high up on the mountain – literally on the slopes of Mt. Etna (though happily more north & west than Etna’s usual path). Keep in mind that about 10 days before I came to Italy, Mt. Etna began to smoke & spit – and some tourists (Chinese I believe) got hit & burned by rocks that were “thrown” from the volcano.
Not to worry – according to the locals, the volcano is always smoking & spitting and there’s nothing to worry about. Apparently, that was the least of our worries. The real issue was “could we find the place?”. The host had given us some rudimentary instructions – something like, follow our signs up the mountain (we found about 12 of them) but apparently missed others. We had GPS going and it took us “off road” and way out of the way. Thank God I had downloaded the directions onto my phone from GoogleMaps and we finally turned that on & found it after driving all over the mountain for about an hour (should have taken about 15 minutes). **Note: At this point, I’m hoarding data usage, of which GPS is a big old hog. Since I’ve already blown through my international data bucket and had to have Scott call Verizon to add more – I chose not to use my phone in the first place.
Side note – drive took forever, but was BEAUTIFUL. There are old estates & villas with terraced hillsides all over the mountain – some are abandoned, but others had been restored extensively and were amazing. La Pietra Antica is one of them. It’s an old winery and in its glory, I’d bet it was a beauty. Stone buildings dot the property which is planted with old growth citrus and other blooming trees and they’ve converted the buildings into guest rooms, a wonderful restaurant & a cool bar with a library. There are cats EVERYWHERE – and a cute donkey named Bellino & a tiny goat named Bellina. The place is run by Nunzia and her sister and their two cousins . . all women!
So Nunzia is happy that we’ve finally made it and she asks if we want to have dinner up there tonight. (Note: Agritourisms let you choose your meal plan – B&B for breakfast only; Half Board for breakfast & dinner or Full Board for all meals.) We had chosen B&B – but knew that we had the option to opt for other meals so when she asked – Sherine & I quickly said in unison – “yes”! Besides being hungry, there was NO WAY we were driving down off that mountain at night (plus, I promised Mom I wouldn’t drive in Italy at night – so far Mom, I’ve honored that request . . and trust me, it won’t be hard to keep it!).
The next day we decide to drive into Siracusa. You should have seen the “Meet Fabrizio of Siracusa” post, so I won’t belabor you with more details – but the drive back up to La Pietra Antica was much easier than the previous day. We had dinner up at the “farm” again that night and decide the next day would be a “down day” (coincidentally, also my birthday) since we would be going to Agrigento the following day (2 ½ hour drive) to tour the famous ruins of Greek Temples. I wake up about 4am to some loud rumbling noise and am convinced it was the volcano making itself known. It stops & I go back to sleep. I wake about 6:30am to find that we have NO POWER!
We go up for breakfast about 9am – still NO POWER. We decide it will be laundry day and find a laundry service down in town. We manage to get the GPS to get us there – but find that the street parking requires a permit – but no one seems to know where to buy one (since there are not machines on the streets like we have in the States). Sherine asks in the pharmacy and is told to go down the street and off she goes. In the meantime, I go back to the car to get some stuff out (as you know, you’re told never to leave stuff in your car in Italy). I look around and she’s gone. I go back into the pharmacy and a different person tells me to go across the street and go to the 3rd door. That’s closed & locked up, so I ask the wine shop next door if they know where I can get a permit. A nice young man says “next door” – but I tell him it’s closed – so he goes next door & bangs on the door until the old man that runs the place comes to open the door. The young guy tells the old guy I need parking permits and he needs to open up to sell them to me – AND he does! I hand him a 2 Euro coin and he needs to give me .60 Euro in change, but he doesn’t have it – only .40 Euro. I try to tell them both it’s OK – I don’t need the change - but the young guy is not going to let the old guy get away with this and insists that he give me my change. Somewhere the old guy finds the extra .20, hands me 2 permits (for 2 hours) and I’m on my way. Sherine comes back a couple minutes later with 2 permits as well. Now, we’re more than set.
We have to leave the laundry and the attendant says we can pick it up at 8pm that same day. I ask in Italian if there’s any way we can have earlier it and she says Ok, 6pm (I really don’t want to drive in the dark). She agrees and we decide to walk around this lovely little seaport called Riposto and end up having lunch and a birthday gelato. I drag Sherine around the marina area and she’s patient with my infatuation of the various fish markets & produce stands that I can’t stop photographing! We drive back up to La Pietra to find still – NO POWER. WE rest a bit and then go back to town to pick up the laundry and return to – still NO POWER! So Nunzia says we will be having dinner by candlelight and it will be romantic!! I haven’t mentioned that it’s off season, and dinner each night was us and another table of two – a very nice German couple! We all had dinner that night in the dark, by candlelight and Nunzia brought out dessert truffles with a little candle and they all sang Happy Birthday to me! Still no POWER – so Nunzia brings Sherine & me each a little propane lantern and we go off to our rooms to pack, as it will be an early start tomorrow.
We wake up and STILL NO POWER!! Of course, no power means, no hot water – so we put CLEAN clothes on our DIRTY bodies and go up for final breakfast. Nunzia apologizes for about the 10th time for the power situation and presents us with a nice bottle of wine as a going away gift. We leave a big tip for the wonderful staff and Nunzia is puzzled and asks “even with the power outage?”. I assure her that they more than earned it. We drive down the hill for the last time and agree, we could probably do it now – IN THE DARK!
