Firenze 2006-2007

Field Trip in Sicilia

At 4:30am last Tuesday, the group left on its academic field trip for the fall semester. We were heading to take a tour of the region of Sicily, the famous island at the tip of the Italian boot.
We all made it out the door by about 430 and were headed to the airport on the bus. We checked in, got on the plane, and crashed. Next thing I remember is landing and getting off the plane. We then retrieved our baggage and headed out to our bus which would become something like our home for the trip. We then headed into Montreale, a small town with a beautiful cathedral above the capital of Sicily, Palermo. We toured the cathedral, saw the many, many mosaics that literally cover every inch of the cathedral there.
(The courtyard of the church in Montreale)
(Katie and Me in the courtyard.)
From there, we head down into Palermo, where we visit the Palatine Chapel, a chapel built in a palace for the rulers of Sicily back in the day, and then the cathedral in the middle of the city. By lunch time we were exhausted and all churched out. We had an hour or so break for lunch, so Steven, West, Alex, and I headed in the direction of a street market where we looked around for something that looked good. Alex and I decided on some random café which turned out to be amazing. I couldn’t tell you exactly what I ate, but they were both things that locals ordered, both were pretty good, and both way cheap so I was content. We then headed to the meeting place, the opera house and headed off with the group to look at several famous fountains in Palermo, then another church! We made it through the fairly short afternoon portion of the tour and headed to our hotel, the Astoria Palace (the same one the group stayed in 3 years ago), and then Alex, West, Steven, and I went for a walk around the city in our free time before dinner. We got back and still had some time, so we watched a movie and then headed down to dinner. It was pretty good, but most importantly, it was a lot of food. We had a long meal, and then headed back upstairs to turn our hotel room into a casino. Us guys then played some poker and then went to bed.
(The group infront of a fountain in Palermo.)
Our next day started at 8am, when Alex, my roommate for the trip, and I went down to breakfast. We ate, packed, and then headed out with the group for Cefalu’, a small city on the coast about an hour trip from Palermo. We toured another church in Cefalu’, this one was much better than the ones the day before as we were all rested and able to pay attention a bit better. From there we walked around the city and say some other points of interest before our free time for lunch and the beach. I had a pizza with Drew, Brooke B, Jennifer, Molly, Brie, Lindsay, and Lauren H. From there we headed down to the beach where most of us went for a swim before taking a quick nap on the beach. We met up a short while later and headed to Castelbuono and another church! Both were pretty cool, but it was to the point where everyone was getting tired, so the afternoon seemed to drag on a bit. After touring the city, we were back in the bus for a good 2 hours, on the way to the Hotel Kaos in Agrigento, clear across the island. We had a sing-a-long on the bus which made the time pass, and finally, we made it to the hotel where dinner was waiting for us. We ate, and the then guys decided to take a quick swim in the cold, closed pool before turning in. The next morning, we ate breakfast and we off.
(Mike, Keith, Me, Alex, and Conner above Cefalu'.)
The only destination of the day was the valley of the temples in Agrigento. It only took us 15 minutes to make it to the valley and then we split into our groups for the tour of the amazing valley with so many Greek temples. It was exactly as I remember it from ‘03, and we were even supposed to have the same guide that got mad at Chesed, but he bailed. The tour was good, and Pippo, our guide was pretty funny, the only drawback was the fact that it started to rain and I was in shorts and a t-shirt. I survived, and made it back to the bus when the tour ended and we headed into Agrigento for lunch before taking another drive clear across the island to Taromina. After another long, long bus ride we made it into Taromina and the Hotel La Plage which was on the beach. We all had our own “huts” for rooms. We explored our beach, which included an island, then headed into the lower portion of town to look around before dinner. We ended up on another beach and in a market, looking for something to eat. We found some supplies and took them back to the hotel, went to dinner and then Alex and I had several people over and we played some random games and then all went to bed.
(Alex and Me at the valley of the temples.)
(Me and Alex's hut at Hotel La Plage.)
The next day was our tour of Taromina, which included the Greek ruins of an amphitheater, and amazing views. From there, we headed down to the gardens and looked there, and took full advantage of the amazing views a bit more before heading to the duomo of the city, which was our last stop before lunch. Alex and I ate a pizza for lunch and then headed down to the hotel to spend our free afternoon on the beach. Alex, West, Anna K, and I went for a swim and swam about 150meters straight out to a rock, climbed onto it, relaxed there for a bit and in the mean time, others came out too. From there, the four of us swam around the Isola Bella, the island right off the shore of our hotel, about a 3/4 mile swim in the ocean. We were swimming against the current which was kinda tough, but we managed to avoid all the rocks and make it around the island without too much difficulty. The only problems came when we tried to climb up the rocks in the ocean. We got cut up pretty good on our feet, legs, and arms on the fairly sharp rocks. After getting back to shore, West and I decided to head back out to that first rock, and after that short swim, we went into town for some gelato before dinner. We came back to the hotel, ate, showered and were then ready to go into central Taromina for the evening. We rode the funicular up to the town, and looked around there for quite a while before coming back down and spending some more time on the beach before getting to bed quite late.
(The island that came with the hotel, we swam around it. The rock on the far right was the one we swam out to twice.)
(The Greek Ruins in Taromina.)
The next day was our last in Sicily. We ate breakfast at the hotel and then were off to Mt. Etna, the largest active volcano in Europe, with the peak being some 2900m above sea level, and the mountain looks even taller than that as you can see sea level from the summit. After the 2 hour twisting and turning bus ride which was filled with more sing-a-long time, we were there and heading up the mountain in a funicular and off road vehicles. I had been to Mt. Etna before, but last time we went to a crater, this time, there had been an eruption recently, so we went to a small fissure on the side of the mountain to see the point of eruption and see the lava flow down the side of the mountain. I got within 5 feet of flowing lava. Being that close to the lava made the mountain that had some snow on it almost unbearably hot. We took a lot of pictures of the lava, something that most everyone had never seen before in their lives, then continued to walk around the mountain. The guys did long jump competitions around the mountain off little ledges and we had some fun doing random stuff like that before heading back down to the base of the mountain the same way we got to the top.
(Lava!)
(Alex, Lauren, Molly and Me on the mountain.)
(More lava!)
(West, Liz, and Me on the mountain.)

Drew, Alex, West, and I ate a panino at the base of the mountain before getting back on the bus and heading into Catania for an hour or so. It was pouring rain, but we walked around anyway, looking at shops and the duomo. From there we went to the airport, getting there at 6 for an 850 flight. We checked in as early as possible, ate dinner and then went to the gate, about an hour and a half before the original departure time. Shortly after getting to the gate, we saw that the plane was delayed an hour and fifteen minutes, so we had all the time in the world at the gate. I slept some, played cards and listened to music, and then finally boarded the plane. I fell asleep pretty quickly, and woke up when we landed, but it wasn’t in Florence like it should have been. There was apparently heavy fog in Florence so we were rerouted to Bologna. We then had to wait an hour and a half for our bus to come pick us up, and then take another hour and a half bus ride into Florence. We got in at about 330am, 5 hours later than expected. We were all tired and happy to be back, and in our own beds which we all went off to immediately.
Overall, the trip was amazing. Despite the delays to end the trip, it was pretty cool. Taromina was amazing, and seeing the lava on Mt. Etna was a once in a life time experience. I was kinda bummed that we didn’t get to go to Naples and Sorrento like we did in ‘03, but in the end, I think I liked this trip better than the ‘03 trip.

posted by Daniel Williams @ 08:34