Ciao Italia!

This past weekend I had the chance to visit the island of Sicily, just off mainland Italy. My friend Katie has good family friends there so we stayed with them while we were there. After a very long day of traveling on Thursday we finally made it to Taormina, which is just north of Catania, the second largest city in Sicily. Taormina is a very popular tourist town and is the place to be in the summer because it is right on the Mediterranean Sea and has beautiful views.


Thursday night Ricardo, the oldest son of the family we stayed with, took us to a small bakery to try some pizza and pastries and then drove us around the town to see a few of good lookout spots. It was late at night but the lights of the city were still beautiful!


Friday was a pretty lazy day, we sat out on the terrace most of the morning and soaked up the sun, something we haven’t seen too much of in Scotland lately! After an wonderful lunch made by Riccardo’s mother the three of us headed down to walk along the beach. It was very relaxing and a good way to experience the culture of Sicily. After that we headed back to the house to relax until dinner time. Italians eat dinner very late at night, usually around 9 or 10 at night. After dinner we went out to a pub with Riccardo and a friend of his in the next town over. We had a few drinks there and Katie and I tried our first Italian wine... which was of course very good! We went back home and the Italians taught us how to play some card games with a Sicilian deck of cards, which is different than a regular deck. They were so much fun Katie and I both made sure to get a deck before we left.


Saturday was pretty relaxing too. We slept in and then had lunch around 2:00 then soaked up the sun for a little bit more. After that we went to a local hotel to work out for a little bit and swim. It felt good to get some exercise after eating so much pasta! Saturday night the family ordered traditional Italian pizzas for dinner. There were about 6 different kinds and I had to try them all. There was an all vegetable one, a traditional margarita pizza which is SO much better than what we have back home, a 4 cheese and prosciutto pizza with blu cheese dressing, one had French fries and sausage, another had hard boiled eggs, peas and ham and the last one I would describe as having a salad on top of it. They were all very good, some more than others though. I think my favorite one was the four cheese with ham! With dinner we had the local beer and watched an Italian football (soccer) game, it almost felt like I was back home again! After dinner we went out to a pub right on the water. It was a beautiful night so we walked around a little bit too. When we went back home it was the Americans turn to teach the Italians some drinking games. Playing with a Sicilian deck of cards made things a lot harder but it was still lots of fun.


Sunday was another day with lots and lots of food. In Sicily, Sunday lunch is a very big deal. The whole family gets together to eat a ton and drink lots of wine. The meal consisted of about 10-15 appetizers brought out one after the other. They included everything from warm ricotta cheese; a seafood platter with octopus, squid and clams; a plate of mozzarella, tomatoes and fresh basil; anchovies flavored with lemon and salt' fried cheese (my favorite); roasted artichokes and many others. I’m proud to say I tried them all, even the seafood which is usually not my favorite. After the appetizers comes the pasta course. The noodles in the pasta were handmade and hand rolled fresh pasta and the whole dish was absolutely amazing! Just when you think the meal is over, they bring out the meat course. I tried a few different things but by this time I was stuffed. And no Italian meal would be complete without Tiramisu! I was so full by this point but it was just so good I had to finish it, there’s always room for dessert right?


After we finished dinner we headed home so the boys could watch a football match on TV. Katie and I decided to skip the game and walk up the hillside instead. It was a long long way up but the views were perfect! At the top of this hill sits a church built right into the hill which was just as beautiful. We could also see Mt. Etna from the top, the volcano on Sicily. This was one of my favorite parts of the trip for sure. By the time we got back down the game was over so Riccardo took Katie and I shopping on some of Taorima's main shopping streets. The shops in Taormina were pretty high end, lots of famous designers, because after all it's Italy! We just bought a few little souvenirs and also got some real Italian gelato. We headed home and had another fabulous dinner and just relaxed for the rest of the night. We even found an NCAA basketball game on TV, it was in Italian most of the time, but Katie and I were still excited to watch it!


Monday was our last full day in Sicily so we did a lot. In the morning we got up around 9:00 and headed to the beach. Sicilians think that this time of year is very very cold and there aren't many tourists in the city either so needless to say we were the only ones on the beach! The water was pretty cold but the sun still felt so nice. After we soaked up some sun we went back to have some lunch. For our last lunch in Sicily, Riccardo's Mom made octopus salad and black ink spaghetti with squid. I was determined to try both of them and neither were that bad, considering I'm not a huge fan of seafood. The spaghetti was interesting, but really didn't have too much flavor. The octopus salad was pretty good, after you got over the sight of the octopus tentacles and the little suction cups! It was definitely the most interesting meal of the trip but still very good.


In the afternoon we finally went to explore the Greek/Roman theatre in Taormina. The theatre is built into the side of the hills and has AMAZING views of the rest of the city and Mt. Etna. After exploring for about an hour and getting lots of good pictures, we headed an hour south to Catania to do some more shopping. We went to the local shopping center, the mall basically, and shopped for a couple hours. We headed back home to Taormina to have our last dinner in Sicily, which was a fabulous salad with tuna fish, mozzarella, cucumbers and tomatoes. We were pretty worn out from our busy day so we had another relaxing night watching a movie and packing up or stuff.


On Tuesday morning, needless to say we did not want to leave! The whole weekend was absolutely perfect and it was nice to be in a home again and eat real home cooked meals, especially Italian. It's definitely going to be hard staying in a hostel after this trip! Staying with a family also gave us a chance to experience the real Italian culture and cuisine. They were so generous to have us in their home for the weekend and show us around their beautiful city. I definitely hope to be back someday!

This blog is long enough so I decided not to put pictures in it. There is a link to a photo album on the right side of the page. Just click on the Sicily one and it should take you right to it!

Until next time... CIAO CIAO!!