Author: hmcreativelady (Page 26 of 48)

What drew me to Sicily? Pure and simply: Montalbano! In general I watch very little TV but over the last few years two detective series have fascinated me – not for their plot, or for their characters, though I have to admit I think  Luca Zingaretti is very cute, but for their settings. One of these was Shetland,  and so in the summer of 2017 off I went for a week on the Shetland Isles. So next on my list was the Sicily of Andrea Camilleri’s Montalbano books. I knew that most of it was filmed in the area of Ragusa, the fictional Vigata, so any trip had to include Ragusa. The towns built on the steep hills are another take on Hebden Bridge, I guess, just 2000 years older. There have been 12 series which have done much to popularize the region and there are many ‘Montalbano tours’ but I wanted something less touristy, so a small group tour that travelled mainly by public transport seemed just the ticket. I found what I wanted online, with a group called G Adventures. it seemed to have the right mix of free time and group time, something that’s always important to me since I’m someone who  needs ‘alone time.’

This was to be my first trip to a non-English speaking country since 2006 when I went to Japan to visit Rachel for her 21st birthday. When I realised that that was 12 years ago I was amazed. I spent the week before my trip in a state of anxiety mixed with eagerness – what a strange combination! I cancelled some regular weekly events because I was so anxious, yet I couldn’t wait to pack my bag (a new one purchased for the trip – a backpack with wheels) and get going. Go figure!

2:40 p.m. Dublin airport, April 21st

A ‘dear diary’ moment: It already feels that I’m getting to know Dublin airport – and it’s not a bad airport to get to know. It’s small enough to be manageable and quiet enough not to be in a state of complete sensory overload. When i emigrated to England last September (can you emigrate to somewhere where you were born and lived for 30 years?) I had had a layover in Dublin, my first visit to that fair city (‘where the boys are so pretty’ quoth Anna). On that occasion I was cocooned in the business class lounge enjoying a pot of Irish breakfast tea – well it was breakfast time and I was in Ireland for the first time.) Then  my first vacation last month was to Ireland, and now, a month later, I’m on a stopover to Catania. The man at the passport control asked me why I was going to Sicily. “To see the architecture,” I replied. “Oh, really?” was his response. “And drink the vino?” he suggested. “Maybe. I’ll see.”

Yesterday a watched a two hour documentary about Sicily on YouTube, pretty well the only forward planning I’d done about what I’d be seeing. I’d no idea the island has so many connections with North Africa and Syria. I saw new vines springing from recent lava flows and 2000 year old stone cisterns where grapes were treaded under foot. The catacombs of Palermo were also featured. Unlike those of rome these bodies are not skeletal. The bodies were mummified, dressed in clothing, and in some instance, posed in family groups, sitting at a table. 8000 bodies lie there. At first it was only monks who were buried there but eventually the aristocracy joined them. I’m not sure if I’ll be brave enough to go there.

It’s a very warm day. On the spur of the moment I’ve decided not to take a jacket on this trip, just a fuzzy blue cardigan I bought earlier this week in the market in Blackburn for a £5 bargain.  Also  at the last minute I added my turquoise ‘evening’ top for the evening passeggiata. I do hope the weather’s not too hot. Looking at the weather forecast I had realised that I couldn’t go to Sicily any later in the Spring because it would be too hot for me to enjoy wandering around the towns and cities. The daytime temperatures are expected to be in the upper 70’sF.

Before the plane could take off from Dublin a man had to be ejected for singing on the plane. OK, he was drunk too. Five security people boarded the plane just as we were about to leave the gate. They handled the situation in a very low key way. When the man insisted that they remove him by force they refused, so there was a stand-off for a while, but in the end he went peaceably enough.

Ejection from the plane before take off

I had a window seat and at one point I could see both the white cliffs of Dover and the French coast at the same time. We had a good view of Paris

Flying over Paris

and the winding Seine before crossing the Alps just as the light was beginning to fade. ‘Pink time’ we used to call this back  in Walnut Creek. 

One of my biggest sources of anxiety was the fact that it would already be dark when I arrived in Catania and the thought of trying to negotiate a bus from the airport to my hotel was overwhelming, so the day before I contacted the concierge at Hotel Trieste and he arranged for a taxi to be waiting at the airport – complete with man with sign with my name on it in Arrivals. And, sure enough, it all came to pass just as planned.

We passed the docks and the long train bridge before getting to the centre of Catania, about 7 kilometres. My first impression as we drove through the town was that I was back in San Francisco. All the vegitation was the same: prickly pear cacti, eucalyptus trees. We passed a McDonalds, and, of course, we were driving on the right. But everything was covered in graffiti. One sign read ‘refugees welcome.’ I asked my driver about that very issue. He was very anti refugee. Sicily doesn’t have the infrastructure, the hospitals, the schools, to deal with such large numbers of refugees. But, of course, that’s what all the countries are saying.  I asked my taxi driver if there would still be eateries open for a quick dinner since it was now after 10 p.m. He laughed,  “The restaurants are just opening. It’s Saturday. ” Indeed. The streets were absolutely full of people, just walking around. I’d landed just as the passeggiata was beginning. We stopped at the end of a tiny alley – just wide enough for one pedestrian and one vespa to pass. He pointed down the alley. “Your hotel is down there.” Should I believe him? Is this is scam to get my money? OMG! A sign, about 9″ wide, announced Hotel Trieste, but huge iron  gates 10ft high were firmly closed. A group of a dozen young teenage boys were gathered around the gate. “How do I get in?” They gave me blank looks. There was a shop next door, and the shopkeeper was standing outside smoking. I asked him the same question – in my best English, of course. He took me by the arm, guided me back to the gate and pointed to  a bell with a sign adjacent the size of a business card. He pressed the buzzer. Magic! The gate opened and found myself in an unlit courtyard. I peered into the gloom, saw some steps, went up, carting my case uncertainly, opened a door and suddenly “Morris” came to my ears. Was I ever so  thankful to hear that word? “Your plane was late.” The owner showed me to my room. “There are 7 rooms. You are in number 7.” OMG. I have shutters. I raced to open them and found my very own verandah overlooking the hustle and bustle of the street below. I asked him where I could get something quick and easy to eat. He explained carefully that when you come to Sicily you have to adopt the time frame of the locals. “Forget quick. Here everything is slow.” He produced a map and pointed out that the hotel is next to the Opera House. Literally the next building. OMG. This is amazing. He gave me a business card of an eatery and 5 minutes after arriving I was off into the street.

The nightly passeggiata (midnight)

There were thousands of people milling to and fro. I remembered this from a night in Naples back in 2003. Remembering the first rule of the tourist in a city at night which is not to look like a tourist I put my map out of sight and headed to the main door of the opera house and the square. I found the place he’d recommended but I just couldn’t get any service at the take-away counter. Groups of people just kept getting in front of me, and I began to wonder if you had to have a ticket first, or even order somewhere else. Besides I didn’t recognise any of the food! I wandered away, across the buzzing square lined with big outdoor TVs showing football on this Saturday night. I found a quieter sit down outdoors restaurant serving pizza. There was no way I could eat a whole pizza so I managed to ask to waitress through sign language if I could order a slice. No, but at Ceres, just past the next TV I could order a mini pizza! So here I am, at 11:20  eating a

Journal writing at Ceres

Dinner at midnight!

whole mini pizza and watching the world go by. It’s a very pleasant temperature for sitting outdoors. I’m the only person sitting alone, or walking through the square alone. Dead giveaway that I’m a tourist! I think I must be the oldest too. I can see the crumbling walls of the opera house, the ubiquitous graffiti, elaborate wrought iron grills on windows, lighted balconies with terracotta plantpots. Everyone seems in good spirits too. I haven’t seen one drunk, and though there’s a little car with a couple of polizia standing by it they are just observing the crowd, mainly in their 20’s and 30’s. I’m being constantly bombarded by flower sellers and trinket sellers, but nothing too aggressive.

When I finally got back to my room the street noise below was LOUD. I tried closing the shutters but it didn’t make any different –  niente. The floors of the hotel are marble. The rooms must be 20 feet high and the whole building acts as an echo chamber. When I re-watched a Montalbano episode on the evening I got back to England that echo sound effect was what I noticed the most. By the time I’d posted some photos onto Facebook and Instagram to assure friends and family that I had arrived safely, it was 1 a.m. before I got into bed and in spite of the noise I went to sleep immediately. I woke up at 3:30 and peaking through the shutters I could see that the street below was still busy.

View from my room 3:30 a.m.

I’m back in Hebden bridge now and I’ve just looked out of my window. It’s blowing a gale, it’s snowing like crazy and the weather forecast is for -10C overnight. That’s on a par with Ely and Truckee in the South West desert of America for goodness sake. I feel so incredibly fortunate with the weather I had in Ireland. The week before I travelled Hebden Bridge and Dublin were snow-bound. In fact, I should have been going on my trip a week earlier but the band I’m in, the Halifax Concert Band, were recording a CD over the weekend and I wanted to participate. As it turned out the CD recording had to been postponed anyway because the recording engineer was stuck on the West of the Pennines and couldn’t get to Brighouse where we were going to be doing the recording. A couple of days before I left for Ireland the weather got a bit calmer and the snow finally cleared from both the streets in the valley and t’tops. But on the morning I left for Dublin I woke to yet another white landscape and I was only too glad that I’d booked a taxi to Hebden Bridge station even though it’s only about 6 minutes’ walk away from my apartment. Landing at Dublin airport dirty grey snow piles as high as an airplane lined the sides of the runways showing how recently the airport had reopened for business. I’d packed my warmest clothes and didn’t feel cold on the trip despite the coastal winds that were in danger of blowing me over in several locations. The good news is that they were always on-shore winds, or the group wouldn’t have been able to do our hikes. Having arrived in Dublin mid afternoon I found my way to the hostel and realized that the hop-on hop-off bus was just about to finish for the night. If I hurried I could just catch the last bus leaving at 5, but I wouldn’t be able to hop off since there wouldn’t be another one to hop on! So I checked in to the hostel and 5 minutes later I was off to find the bus.

Now I haven’t done any hostelling for a long, long time. The last time I stayed in a Youth Hostel was when we travelled as a family and hiked some of the long distance coastal footpaths around Britain. Possibly the last time was when we hiked the Pembrokeshire coastal path. The hostels I stayed in in Ireland are not YHA hostels, they are just hostels for travellers and though most people staying in them are under the age of 30 since you

Each bunk had a light, sockets and phone charger.

can now book private rooms some families use them. In fact, on this trip I stayed in 4 different hostels, each in a private room with its own bathroom – pretty good, eh! I sat on the open upper deck for the 90 minute bus ride around the town. The downtown area of Dublin has major traffic congestion at the rush hour. I could have walked faster, but then, I didn’t actually have a destination. I was treated to a glorious sunset and ended up

bobbing up and down out of my seat to take tons of photos, trying to capture the right moment for that great ‘sunset over the city’ photo. The next day I awoke to low clouds and drizzle, that sort of murky day when all you want to do is curl up on the sofa with a

Housing built for the Guiness employees in 1901

friendly kitty cat, but our destination, Killarney on the other side of the country, beckoned. Three brave souls opted for the afternoon’s kayaking excursion from which they returned shaking and shivering with cold despite their wetsuits. The rest of us

explored Ross castle that has been lovingly restored to its former glory with fully furnished rooms. The rain hadn’t stopped and low mist was swirling around the hilltops and it looked as though our planned hike tomorrow was going to be cancelled. The next morning the rain was only scattered showers but the clouds and mist were very low and there wouldn’t be any point in hiking to the top of the hill since the whole point was to get a view of the coastal cliffs and the islands. But just as we arrived at our destination one big black cloud suddenly cleared away from the sun and we found ourselves in bright sunshine – and my sunglasses were packed in my suitcase, dammit. The Bray

Head Loop hike was only a couple of hours, a gentle incline which ended abruptly in sheer cliffs. I felt I was back on St Kilda. It was stunning. Parts of the path had become streams but wet feet didn’t deter us. In fact, the weather had become so clear that we were able to see the Skellig islands now a major set location in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Just below and west of a tower, built by the English during the Napoleonic Wars but subsequently used in World War ll as a look out station, are the remains of the word EIRE written using stones in large letters to allow pilots during war times to identify the Irish coastline, a form of early GPS. J.B had each of us stand on one of the still visible stones.

By the time we were back in the bus the clouds had gathered but there was enough light for some good photos with dark foreboding skies above, especially at Muckross, where Queen Victoria stayed for a couple of nights as a guest of the local MP Henry Herbert, who wanted to make a grandiose impression on the queen. Meanwhile the queen’s ladies-in-waiting were taken to a viewing point that overlooks the lakes of Killarney. As a result, it has henceforth been known as Ladies’ View, and though I saw it in the mist it was lovely. It was the queen’s visit that put Killarney on the tourist map for the first time and over 10,000 people attended a firework display in her honour and it was reported that there were 800 boats on the lake. But the poor MP bankrupted himself with his extravagance and was forced to sell Muckross House.

Cliffs of Moher

I agree with Sarah. If you look closely at the two figures they look as if they’re coming to                                                               blows rather than dancing

I can never say I’ve been a lover of traditional Irish music as a genre but I did intend on hearing some live music on my trip. Pretty well all the bars in the tourist towns advertised ‘live music’ at least a couple of nights per week but that didn’t necessarily mean traditional Irish music. The first I sampled was in a bar in Killarney. I’d arranged

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to meet there with a couple of others from the tour but they were too Wet and Tired, as opposed to being Wild ‘n’ Happy and they had an early night, which meant that I was by myself, and looking round, I found that I was not only the only woman alone, but the only person alone in the bar. But, taking the bull by the horns, I sat at the bar with a good view of the corner where the three guys were playing. Within five minutes of beginning

their set at 9 p.m. several people, regular, I would guess, had got up to dance. Perhaps it was a special event for Mothers’ Day. I took a few photos of the band, and me being me, a

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Leaving the Killarney bar to a deserted street

few more photos of the people watching (!). It was pleasant but not particularly enthralling. In Doolin a group of us, under the guidance of J.B walked over a mile along an unlit road to a pub where a band was playing that he’d heard before. I didn’t know at the time that Doolin is famous as the capital of Irish music and each of the four pubs in

the little village feature traditional Irish music nightly. This was more like it. I was introduced to the Irish pipes player, Blackie O’Connell, and I was able to sit within an arm’s reach of him and got to see how this instrument works. With one arm you pump the bellows, with the other arm you squeeze the air bag, with the fingers of both hands

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you play the chanter and with the palm of one hand you operate the drones – all the time tapping your foot noisily on the flag floor to add the percussion. I chatted to the performer. “How much does a set of Uilleann pipes cost?” He made my night when he answered, “How much is a car?”   ‘cause this is always the answer I give when someone asks me how much it costs to buy a piano. But his answer was that you can buy a set for €10,000 but his is a custom made set and cost €25,000. At least you can’t leave a piano behind in a bar – or a car! The second guy, Cyril O’Donoghue was playing a bouzouki, a guitar-like instrument originally from Greece. Unfortunately the third guy who regularly makes up Dubhlinn, playing the fiddle, wasn’t there. When I left at 11:30 they were still going strong.

Reflections on the music of Doolin

You have the admire the tenacity of some of these musicians. As I was hiking at 45 degrees into the wind on the Cliffs of Moher I passed a guy perched on the cliff edge playing the pipes.

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My hands were too cold to take his photo but I thought I’d have better luck on the way back, but by the time  returned he’d just packed up for the day and was wheeling his gear back down to the Visitors’ Centre. 

And, below,  in Galway this street musician took my eye – he had some great moves, if nothing else!

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