Una lunga strada a Laureana Cilento

All good things must come to an end, we finally packed the car and said goodbye to Pinetrees at Cardedu and our hosts, Carlo & Rita, who even went to the trouble of taking us to a fabulous restaurant in the next bay..., we were truly sad to leave: we will return that is for sure.

Carlo & Rita with MOG

Our next island was to be the rugged and historic Island of Sicily. Sometimes situations and circumstances blend in such a way as to give you a negative and often wrong impression of a place…we experienced this with Sicily. The ferry was old, knackered and very cramped. The lounge was heaving and Female Old Git (FOG) had quite a tussle with a small French party who had commandeered a huge amount of seats and had spread their belongings over a wide area while the rest of the passengers stood and jostled for space. FOG politely asked for a couple of seats, which were empty of course, for a few minutes while we finished our drinks… Well, you would thought she had mentioned Agincourt, Trafalgar and Waterloo in the same sentence…b******ds! (Incidentally FOG bought a children’s history book of France…Trafalgar wasn’t mentioned; now that’s brainwashing).

The next morning we awoke with frostbite, only to find that we had the aircon on full blast all night…we hadn’t noticed the large knob on the grill saying “off”…our sight must have still been impaired by the red mist in our eyes caused by our Gallic friends. The exit from the hold of the ferry resulted in running over a large rubber ‘chock’ which totally ripped the underneath of the Mercedes. A rather loud grinding noise accompanied our departure from the dock and necessitated MOG lying underneath the car to implement some temporary repairs, fortunately the damage was superficial but it would require yet another visit to a garage.

Even docking in Sicily wasn’t straight forward

The roads in Sicily are heavily ridged so our route eastwards was unpleasant and noisy but what disappointed us both was the amount of rubbish strewn along the waysides, scarring the countryside. In addition the skips were all overflowing with rubbish and clearly had not been emptied for some considerable time. We had an appointment with an owner of an apartment in Fondacello near Tiaromino, on the coast, or as the brochure said, 3 minutes drive from the beach. It was also meant to be nestling underneath Mount Etna and boasted some stunning views of this active and largest volcano in Europe. As we approached the Catanian area and Mount Etna, so the black clouds appeared and the rain started. We met the couple just off the autostrada and they showed us the way to Cell Block H, opps sorry, the apartment. The road to the ‘gated complex with swimming pool’ could only be described as an ex-WWII runway which had been abandoned since 1945…except for the fly-tippers, who had clearly been out in force.

Cell Block H (On the right is the swimming pool, empty of course and clearly hadn’t been used for some time)

The Beach…easy 3 minutes drive away…you wouldn’t want visit here even if it was 3 seconds walk…

Why we didn’t just turn around and find somewhere else to stay is a mystery, but old English manners prevailed. We nodded politely, handed over our money and, when alone, sank into depression still trying to encourage each other with remarks like; “Well it is very cheap…”; “It may look better in the sunshine…”

In order to escape this dingy place we decided to take a sight seeing trip to Taormina which had been highly recommended.

Typical Taormina street & lemon stall

Despite the continuing rain and dark clouds this was a beautiful town, but a real tourist trap and the consequential high prices; however it did have a real charm about the place. MOG found an old Roman amphitheatre which had just been discovered…under some old houses!

Roman amphitheatre…not a bad cellar

We sat in silence on our return to Cell Block H, but things were about to deteriorate further. The whole complex was empty, with over grown gardens and an atmosphere of complete desolation. We suddenly realised that when they described a gated community it meant that the ‘gate’ must have been trying to keep people in!

The only other apartment being used was, of course, the one directly below us and its inmates were the family from hell; this included all grand parents, uncles, aunts, cousins…you name it they where there in force and their vocal cords were on full volume and in constant use. Upstairs, the Old Gits sat in a total and stunned silence. The next day we managed to manoeuvre our car around the howling kids and ventured south to Siracusa.

On leaving the Etna region the dark clouds diminished and the sun appeared and we spent a pleasant day strolling around this ancient city with its origins not in Romans times but the Greeks 500 BC! Dear old Archimedes lived and worked here only to be so engrossed in his work that he failed to hear the warning shouts that the Romans were attacking and was promptly run through by a legionnaire…he didn’t shout “Eureka!” that time…

Siracusa’s Duomo

Modern art flourishes here, as well as the ancient, but is this someone else who might have stayed at Cell Block H?

Conversation diminished as we returned northwards and encountered the black clouds and rain and as we opened the gate to our self made prison we could see the other inmates hadn’t escaped and their numbers had if anything increased. On our ‘terrace’ constructed of ‘ancient’, or more accurately crumbling, breeze block we sat gazing upon where Mount Etna was suppose to be, while trying to ignore the pandemonium that was unveiling below us…it was nearing feeding time. Etna, as a young virgin bride, had coyly kept herself veiled in her clouds only occasionally revealing a glimpse of her shoulder… Suddenly MOG snapped and jumped up, grabbed his mobile, proceeded to the noisy terrace, and called the owner, who could clearly hear the pandemonium from the apartment below. A few minutes later he had negotiated the release of the Old Gits and the balance of our payment…, we couldn’t wait for the morning.

Morning did finally arrive to a watery sun and for a few short minutes the clouds cleared to reveal the snowed capped Mount Etna…, in her glory…it gave us pangs to go skiing!

Mount Etna reveals herself…at last

MOG drove swiftly northwards heading for the islands off the north coast of Sicily only to experience yet more rumbling from underneath the car and even more dark clouds and bad weather ahead. A brief discussion resulted and we decided to cut our losses and we found our selves, not on the ferry to the Isole Eolie, but on a ferry to Villa San Giovanni, on the mainland. We had always wanted to take a serious look at the National Park of Cilento and Vallo di Diano, south of Salerno, a reputedly unspoilt area of Italy. After an overnight stop in a lovely hotel in Marina di Maratea, and even more stunning coastal views…, some quite scary especially for FOG, we moved towards our goal.

FOG will be up dating the sister blog:

http://www.facts-oldgitsgapyear.blogspot.com/

in the next few weeks…


Coastline around Sapri: (note where the road goes!)

The next day we had found a house, owned by an Englishman, in Laureana Cilento. Our ‘sat-nav’ had been ‘off the mark’ in Sardinia and Sicily, and she wasn’t doing too well in the south of Italy. She had real problems trying to find this remote hill top town and had us going down tracks that farm vehicles wouldn’t have attempted!

Signposts weren’t that clear!

Finally, with the engine nearly overheating, we stumbled into a tiny piazza and there in front of us was “Blu di Prussia Café”, where we were to pick up our key.

All that can be said at this point is, after a superb lunch and several carafes of wine later with the owners Mimmo (a renowned artist and quite eccentric, more on him later!) & Teresa, his beautiful Australian/Italian wife, that we have fallen on our feet again… I can’t wait to write the next posting…; I’ve just got a feeling this is going to be bit of a crazy week…

View from Laureana Cilento towards Agripoli

Mimmo & MOG – Two artists…one uses a paint brush…!