Day 3

The day begins with the long goodbye. Lidia and Alberto asked us to have coffee with them but we wanted to get on the road. There were pictures taken by all in all combinations and a ‘quick’ peek at the website with comments about the comments left by others. We say goodbye to the dogs… Fanny, Lise, Fred and Lulu… and we’re off.

Agrigento… no haircut. We did however find the Valle de Templi. Amazing ruins of more Greek temples. There was an interesting contemporary art exhibition in the Tempio della Concordia . It was cool to see how well the modern works fit in the ancient architecture. There are gardens behind the golden villa filled with lavender and rosemary. The place smells like a Crabtree and Evelyn. It is clear and sunny and 87 degrees and I swear to you that the sun is physically way closer to Sicily than it is to Michigan. Sunburn? yes. Exhausting? Yes.

So we are off to Noto. We have found the signage in Italy remarkably helpful in finding our way from street to street and town to town… until now. Sicilians seem to figure that since they know how to get from place to place, all they have to do is point and say something like “it’s hard to explain.” We have a good map that has served us well all over Tuscany, Umbria, From Positano to Como and all points in between. But in Sicily? The map seems to be how they imagine it to be. Signs would help.

So we are off to Noto. We have found the signage in Italy remarkably helpful in finding our way from street to street and town to town… until now. Sicilians seem to figure that since they know how to get from place to place, all they have to do is point and say something like “it’s hard to explain.” We have a good map that has served us well all over Tuscany, Umbria, From Positano to Como and all points in between. But in Sicily? The map seems to be how they imagine it to be. Signs would help.

We finally ask directions from a fellow we have since affectionately named Guido in our retelling of the story amongst ourselves. He points and gestures and repeats himself and tells us that it is difficult to explain and asks if we don’t have a GPS… We head off opposite the direction we were going, into the early afternoon. As we find ourselves with no clue if we are going the right way or not we simply trust in the fact that Guido told us that it would be very curvy and there will be a lot of climbing. Well… we seem to be headed up a mountain through a long series of switchbacks and so decide that we are going the right way. Half an hour or so later we hit the top of the mountain and find ourselves on SS115… exactly where we wanted to be. There is much joyous swearing. Onward to Noto and our next place. Valle degli Dei.

As we approach Noto, there is plenty of guessing and sure enough we see a sign… and it is a big sign with an arrow for Valle degli Dei. Not that hard to find and we are much relieved. A large villa with several small guest houses and a beautiful pool. Yes it’s in a valley so there are no sea vistas but there are lemon trees and pomegranate trees and palm trees and flowers everywhere. The grounds are beautiful. The apartment is decent but not great.

It is Sunday and we need supplies. We are informed that there is a place about 6 kilometers away that has everything we need and is open till 10pm. Great! We’ll hit the groceries, get a little something for breakfast and some snacks. We also decide to get something for dinner so we don’t have to try to find our way through Noto for the first time in the dark. Off we go. Again… the directions were way simpler than the reality and the lack of signage is a challenge for sure. Did I mention that the Sicilian drivers take “Italian driving” to another level. Perhaps we need to trust our instincts more because just as we start to convince ourselves that we are on the wrong road, around the next corner is Il Giardino ! Damn… we’re getting good at this. We were expecting a grocery, like a Krogers or a Spartan or Jewel or something. What we got was something like a Wallmart super center crossed with an outlet mall and a circus midway. This place made the worst Wallmart seem like a Zen garden. We did it though and found our way home in the dark too. Tortolloni, asparagus, a little wine, a little cheese… ah. I will never speak disparagingly about what it’s like to go to Meijer’s again.

There are lizards in Sicily. Those quick little green lizards that you see sunning themselves on walls and zipping under planters and into cracks. There are also geckos. These you see right at the top of the wall against the ceiling directly above your pillow when you get ready for bed. Donna was not amused. Lise explained that they eat mosquitoes and the little fellow was reluctantly allowed to stay.