Europe

2018

Day 9


Decided to have a quiet day and enjoy the house. After getting the laundry going we decided to enjoy a nice brunch in the front yard of the house. We had cheese, prosciutto, fruits and yogurt. It was lovely to sit and enjoy the beautiful air and scenery and just chill.

After enjoying our food we decided it was time to go to Le Marina for gelato recommended by Alessia. It was about 3kms away and when we got there we decided to try flavors she recommended which were Modica pepperoncino and cinnamon chocolate and peanut. Steve decided to get pistachio (as they are from Catania) and almond. Once we had our gelato we were ready to get moving and do the 6km bike ride to Punta Secca another little town Alessia said we could visit. We had to get use to riding on the other side of the road and also the hard seats which made our bums a little sore!

When we arrived in Punta Secca there was a big light house there. We decided to get some freshly squeezed juice at a bar as we were pretty sweaty from the ride. After this we were ready for the ride back which was a little cooler but still beautiful. Definitely hoping I get a tan from the amazing weather šŸ˜ but we have lathered up with sunscreen!

We finally arrived home with sore butts, did some blogging and had showers. Salvatore came over to pick us up around 6:30-7:00 to take us to nonnas house for dinner again. This time was fairly special because we had a very traditional food that is really only find in Ragusa: Scacce, Focaccia and Bonata! There was cheese and tomato scacce which was my favourite as a child when we visited my nonno (on my dadā€™s side), this is kind of like a lasagna but thicker and breadier (if thatā€™s a word), a ricotta one, an eggplant one and finally the Bonata which is like a pie with diced lamb inside and very thick pastry walls. There were a bunch of side dishes too including mushrooms, bread, cheese, salami and olives. Then for dessert we had white mulberries picked from their friends garden, apricots (along with a few other fruits on the fruit bowl), left over cassata and almond biscuits. It was a great dinner!

After dinner we packed up the table and the others started playing briscola, an Italian card game. We didnā€™t play but I showed Bec what the cards look like as they are pretty different to our usual playing cards. On our way out we happened to go in to the back room of the house and there were boxes of fresh tomatoes, Salvatore said that Sicily is the biggest provider of tomatoes for Italy and that these came from a friend of his, so he gave us a bag to take with us, canā€™t wait to eat them!

After dinner Salvatore and Carmella took us to Scicli, which we passed through to go to Modica last time. Itā€™s a really nice place and the architecture is pretty cool, almost everything is made of stone! When we arrived there was a big open space with lights and a DJ playing tango music and a bunch of people dancing in the street. Of course, Salvatore saw a friend of his here too, he is a very popular man!

There was a festival happening here today and there were stalls lining the streets. This area seems like it has a lot of religious history and there is a convent on top of the mountain overlooking the township that was all lit up at night along with a theatre stage for performances.

It was a nice night to walk around this very pretty town. Salvatore and Carmella gave us some history of the buildings, we tried our best to understand and we got quite far with Google translate. There were a few details Iā€™m sure we missed without Alessia translating but I think we did quite well and had some good conversation.