Sicily, Italy

And so my Italian odyssey comes to an end. It's been pretty splendid all round. Obviously nobody needs me to tell them that Italy is full of historical interest and tasty pizzas. The only advice I'd venture to dish out is that you should avoid Naples like the plague, and that Siena and Bologna are my personal tips for places that might not necessarily be on everyone's radar.

From Salerno I took a scenic train down the west coast to Villa San Giovanni, which is the 'toe' in the 'boot' of Italy. Then a quick ferry over the Strait Of Messina to Sicily. It's only €2.50 for a pedestrian fare. First I stayed on the east coast in Naxos, which is not to be confused with the eponymous Greek island, although that's probably where it got its name, having been founded by the Greeks nearly 3000 years ago. 

Just up the road from Naxos is Taormina, one of Sicily's main tourist draws. It was a haunt of Oscar Wilde and there's a statue of him near the cathedral, bearing a quote from one of his letters home, praising Taormina to the heavens. This being southern Italy, the inscription states blandly that the letter was to 'his love', remaining coyly silent about the particular species of 'love' to which Wilde was inclined. But I suspect there's something subversive going on when the inscription then invites you to download more info: "bring your smartphone close to Oscar Wilde's ring". The one on his finger, that is.

After Naxos I spent a very leisurely day travelling all the way across the island to Cefalu, another popular seaside resort. I didn't bother spending time in any of Sicily's big cities: that'd be like going to the Lake District and camping out in Carlisle. At this point in December, the sun is still shining, but many of the hotels are closed and the towns are half-empty, which means that a) AirBnB apartments are dirt cheap and b) everything's nice and quiet.

Overall I enjoyed Sicily more than I was expecting. In the future I can see it competing with southern Spain as my regular short-term refuge from UK-based winter blues. Naturally my assumption had been that I'd be travelling on creaky wooden train carriages, with everyone around me wearing a beret, carrying a shotgun, and accompanied by a goat. I'm glad that my prejudices have been confounded, although I still had to stop myself from unconsciously whistling the "Godfather" theme wherever I went. And it'd be nice to stay longer, but going home to catch up with everyone for Christmas - well, that sounds like an offer I can't refuse...

Next year's travels will start very soon and will be a distinct change of scene to say the least. In the meantime, buon Natale a tutti.

Cefalu in the morning

Cefalu cathedral

Viewing platform for volcanic islands in the sea (Stromboli et al). Look closely at the horizon.

Looking east from the top of the hill over Cefalu

Palermo Centrale train station

Taormina, seen from the castle on high. Roman theatre in the middle at the top.

View east from Taormina

The beach at Naxos.
Also Etna (11,165ft), Europe's biggest active volcano. Those aren't clouds.

Edd vs Food #148
Pinsa, not pizza, at History Pinsa in Cefalu.
See here for the difference between pinsa and pizza. It was news to me.
Pork and red onion and fries and mozzarella. Note the total absence of tomatoes.

Salerno, Italy

I'm back down south again. Just keeping you all on your toes.

Amalfi, Positano, Sorrento. As well as being generic Italian restaurants from my younger days, they're also hugely popular tourist destinations, close to each other on Italy's south-west coast. But I've had my fill of tourist destinations recently, so I skipped them all and came to Salerno instead.

I read up on a bit of history before embarking on this trip. Salerno was where Allied forces made their first landing, from Sicily, on the Italian mainland in 1943. It was then for a time in 1944 the official capital of free Italy, while the Germans were still occupying Rome. Switching sides mid-war left a lot of people high and dry, and the reprisals were terrible, not just from the Germans but between Italians themselves. In some cases the Nazi collaborators got what they deserved; in many others it was just opportunistic score-settling. It's hard to avoid drawing uncomfortable parallels with what must be going on in Syria right now.

A short way out of Salerno to the east, there's a cemetery which holds the graves of 1,851 soldiers from the UK and Commonwealth. The cemetery is directly managed by the UK government, specifically the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. It's a lovely quiet spot, carefully maintained, with mountains to the north-east and the blue Tyrrhenian Sea rippling gently to the south-west. It's also rather isolated, with no built-up areas or train stations nearby, and getting there involves a rattly 40-minute bus ride. I had the cemetery entirely to myself for a protracted wander around on a sunny December morning. 1,742 of the headstones bear names and ages and regiments, but there are also 109 with an inscription noting only that the young man's name is 'known unto God'.

Obviously I spend most of my travels eating and drinking to excess, and making undiplomatic observations about the locals. But there are occasional serious moments too, and none more so than being here and seeing so many gravestones bearing the emblem of the Durham Light Infantry. It made me very contemplative indeed to imagine myself having been born just 50 years earlier than I was. Never forget.

The town of Salerno itself is perhaps a bit rough and ready, but I don't mind that, and anyway it's still a lot more civilised than Naples. Also most of the people seem to be actually Italian and that wouldn't have been the case in Amalfi or wherever. 

My blog has been a bit behindhand of late, which is why the updates are now coming thick and fast while I get caught up. Only one more to go after this.

Looking east early in the morning. This looks like a panorama picture, but it isn't

Rusting relics of seaside glory. Reminds me of home and makes me happy. 

Salerno's 11th century cathedral, at sunset

Some corner of a foreign field

Christmas procession in the old town

Piazza Flavio Gioia

Edd vs Food #147
Poke bowl at Hello Poke
Sweet potatoes, purple cabbage, feta cheese, red onion, spicy mayo, crispy onion bits.
Basmati rice underneath.

San Marino

When I went to the Vatican City last month, I set a new record for my shortest-ever visit to a foreign country. Judging from the timestamps on my photos, it was literally 20 minutes or so. San Marino gets a silver medal, because I was there for about an hour and a half.

I went to San Marino solely in order to be able to say that I've been to San Marino, and thus to inflict this completely pointless blog upon you all. I knew nothing about the place before arriving, and I can't say I learned much while there, other than that the main bit of it sits on top of a mountain, with a handy cable car. So let's fall back on Google...

It's the world's oldest surviving republic. The population is officially 33,642. (Roughly equivalent to three council wards in Sunderland. Pallion & Millfield & Barnes, or something like that.) It's not in the EU, and I suspect the main reason is that there's no way the big EU states would want to hand veto powers to 33,642 people. Currently the EU member with the smallest population is Malta, which does at least boast a population of half a million.

San Marino's football team started competing officially in 1990. Harry Kane has scored more goals against San Marino than any other country he's played against. They've only ever won three games, all of them against Liechtenstein (population: 39,584). Must be galling for the Liechtenish or whatever they call themselves. People from San Marino are officially called sammarinese.

Well, anyway, thanks for reading.

View to the north-west

View to the west

Statue Of Liberty

Looking at the Third Tower from the Second Tower

Edd vs Food #146
Cheesy chili hot dog from, er, a stall.