At long last, the final entry in the Southern Italy saga... and only a month and a half after it actually took place. Better late than never, I suppose. Anyway, the morning we left Cefalu, the Mediterranean was pretty angry, and the waves were a lot bigger than they had been on any other day of our trip. While this normally wouldn't be a problem, our final destination for the day was a night boat back to Naples... some pictures of the waves are below.
After we packed up and checked out of the lovely Hotel Tourist (goodbye to the awesome Italian breakfasts... and ice-cold showers), we threw our bags on the bus and travelled to the nearby town of Castelbuono since we had the morning and part of the afternoon to kill before we caught our boat. The town was a lot like Erice, in that it was very quiet... almost unnervingly so. None of us really had any idea what we were doing there or where in God's creation we were, because I don't think any of us had ever heard of Castelbuono before... it turned out to be a pretty interesting out-of-the-way place though. Our first stop was a small old church towards the center of the city.
The basement of the church had a crypt, with Jesus' passion portrayed on all the walls by local artists.
One of the side chapels on the main floor of the church.
After the church, we went outside and headed to a natural history museum, with lots of examples of plant and animal life from all over Sicily. Here are some shots on the way to the museum, as usual the weather was almost perfect... we couldn't have asked for bluer skies.
The "castle" part of Castelbuono. This is on one of the city's piazzas and reached by a pretty epic set of stairs. The inside is a museum, split between modern art and the history of the castle.
The castle is on what seemed to be the highest point in Castelbuono, and had some pretty awesome views of the surrounding countryside.
Our group in the castle's central courtyard.
One of the cool art rooms in the castle... it was an interesting juxtaposition seeing the modern art displayed in these old, dark castle rooms. It was an awesome place to walk through, with lots of different levels, sizes of rooms, and interesting details.
The castle piazza and the town and mountains beyond.
This shot makes me feel like the Von Trapp kids are going to come out and sing at any moment...
A parting shot of Castelbuono as we boarded the bus... another gorgeous day.
After we left Castelbuono, we drove back to Palermo through some beautiful countryside. Lots of mountains and cactus, and this awesome bridge running through a mountain... we tried holding our breath through each of the tunnels we went through, which wouldn't have been so bad if they weren't back to back to back... I think a lot of brain cells were killed on the road back to Palermo due to lack of oxygen.
Back at the port of Palermo, we had about 15 minutes to find food to take on the Snav and sidestep the cafeteria onboard... and on a Sunday in Italy, this is far easier said than done. So we sprinted out of the port of Palermo looking for any open fast restaurant where we could grab something and run back. We did find a place several blocks away, but unfortunately had the slowest people in the history of time giving us our food... oh well, we sprinted back to the boat and boarded with our grub. It was another long night on the Snav... I didn't take any pictures since I'd taken so many on the first boat trip. Basically, I did nothing that would upset my stomach due to the rocking boat... I watched Garden State, an episode or two of Rescue Me, wandered around the boat... nothing too earth-shattering.
Here's a shot of the boat in the port of Naples the next morning. We disembarked and piled into taxis for the train station... another death-defying taxi experience... you just have to accept the fact that when you pay for a cab or shuttle in Italy, you basically agree to being seconds from death for extended periods of time. However, we made it to the train station in the hopes of catching an earlier train, but that was not to be.
A shot of the Galleria dome from the port.
At the train station, we put our bags in a huge pile and set up camp at the train station McDonalds... we had a good five hours to wait for our train. If this picture makes it look like we were completely exhausted and crabby, its only because we were... two weeks is a long time to travel with the same people. I dug a hole in the pile of bags, settled in, and read some of The Architecture of Happiness. During this time, Judy also interviewed a bunch of us about our Southern Italy experiences while it was still fresh in our minds. We listened to non-stop Shakira on a loop for hours and hours, and I finally caved and bought some McDonalds... it tasted good after so much time without it. Anyway, we finally got our train and headed back to Rome, ending two weeks of an overall amazing trip. The work we did in Cefalu was just the start of several larger projects to come, but it was a great two weeks, filled with great places and new experiences.
In closing... the sunrise over the port of Naples... finally!
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