Day 12 started with another breakfast eaten outside, under cloudless blue skies. When we get home, it’s going to be the outside living that I will miss the most. We’ve barely been inside the igloos, except for sleeping and the occasional bit of cooking (and even the majority of that has been done outside).
The plan for today was to explore Ortigia – the small island attached by two bridges to Syracuse. We had a boat tour booked for 1pm, but had read that the market is impressive, so (after yet more very interesting Sicilian driving and yet more interesting directions from TomTom) we found a parking spot and headed there first.
I think we had possibly missed the best of it, but we were still wowed by the array of fresh sea food, the enormous onions and, in particular, fresh spices, herbs and nuts, which filled the air with appetising and tempting aromas.
We then found a bank (which had a policeman outside and security pods to go through!) to top up the kitty! I was quite proud of the way that the market stall owner had understood my Italian, and that I had understood his reply – thank you Maria Battagliese, if you’re reading this!
Opposite the bank was a small archaeological site, with greek columns.
I think today must have been one of the hottest days so far, so we cooled off with granite (an Italian specialty, but particularly special to Sicily – it’s basically Slush Puppy, but sooooo much nicer!). I chose orange this time, and was pleasantly surprised to discover that it was made with freshly squeezed juice – delicious!
We then headed off to find the meeting point for the boat tour, which I had found and booked online. As it was away from the port and the bridges, where all of the rest of the tours go from, it took some finding, but not too much and in plenty of time for our trip.
We were walked all the way back to the port to get onto the boat, which was small, but perfect for the group of 10 of us (one big family and us two). Unfortunately, unlike I had been assured via email, the driver of the boat did not speak English! Fortunately, however, he gave very little information anyway, and we greatly enjoyed the short pootle along the side of Ortigia. The island is stunningly beautiful, with bright white buildings, many palazzi and a huge duomo (which I will come back to later).
Next, we headed out onto the open sea, which was rather choppy but lots of fun! We had chosen the tour that took us along the coast to visit the sea caves, and we had chosen well! Like the coastline by the cottage, the cliffs were dramatic and riddled with beautiful rock formations (see “Elephant Rock below) and alcoves of varying sizes, some of which were (just) big enough to drive our boat into! The clarity of the water and the submarine orange flowers, as well as the stalactites, were astonishing, and well worth the 15E each that we had each paid.
The driver took us a different route back to the port. This involved travelling underneath the two bridges connecting Ortigia and Sicily. “So?” I hear you cry! Well, the archways under the first bridge were less than 5 feet high! Everyone was duly instructed to duck (or something similar in Italian!). I don’t think any of us actually believed he was going to go for it, until we were heading under, at which point we all crouched in the bottom of the boat! Tom has a brilliant video of this, which we’ll share when we get home! All in all, it was a fabulous tour and full of great fun!
For the rest of the afternoon, we pottered around the rest of the island, with a couple of stops for Tom to drone.
We particularly liked (and recommend) the giudecca – the old Jewish part of the island. It’s much quieter than the main thoroughfare and we stopped at a little cafe to share some chips (the first of the holiday, for those of you who know quite how much I love them!) and top up on liquid.
Once we reached the very bottom of the island (minus the castle, which doesn’t seem to be open to the public), Tom sent his drone up again for some more stunning shots of the unique place.
We walked back up through the tourist route (via a cafe where we finally found some vegetarian arancini!), which brought us into the Piazza del Duomo. Wow! It’s long, paved with white marble and has the outstandingly beautiful cathedral. It was originally a greek temple, built more than 300 years BC, and adapted to a Christian church much later. The original columns can still clearly be seen on the outside. As there was a wedding about to start, we only had a quick peak inside, but were equally impressed by its interior!
A short potter back to the car (just in time for our 6 hours of parking to run out!) and we headed back to the igloos for more relaxing, blogging, and a super scrummy dinner of pasta and rich sauce prepared by my wonderful husband!
Tomorrow we plan on exploring a local beach, with more snorkeling on the cards 🙂