I was asked to write a full report on the island of Sicily. Because even though I’ve written about nothing else for the last week, for some people (you know who you are), that’s not enough. No. They want to be spoon-fed the details, they want bullet points and guarantees, issued by me, with full, money-back contracts in case I steer them wrongly.

Yet the fact of the matter is; you can’t steer wrongly. If you get lost, you’ll end up somewhere fabulous. The whole island is just… beautiful. Ok, you could find a slum in Palermo, if you looked hard enough, I dare say, but why the fuck would you? When there is just so much beauty around.

Not necessarily the Sicilians, they’re a dour and quite unfriendly bunch really. If you ‘bonjourno’ people on the street they ignore you or pull a gun. The service in most restaurants needs improving just a little, so that customers aren’t made to feel they’re a nuisance and in the way. When we complained because they’d fucked up Mel’s coffee the other morning, the young misery just said “well that’s what you fucking ordered!!!” (Which it wasn’t) But in Italian. Then Rachie came over and his miserable face lit up with a big smile and he ‘turned on the charm’ (in Sicily that means: ‘put the gun away’). Sexist, ageist little shit.

You drive mainly round the coast, obviously, and, although quite lacking in many beaches, being volcanic-like, it is simply wonderful. Most beautiful place in the world. In the same way that the record now playing on the radio is ‘my favourite song ever’. There’s a recency effect. The places we stopped at were fab, we took a little trip to a town called Noto which is the island’s most magnificent collection of Baroque buildings, but I must warn you that the ice creams there are a rip-off.

Then, due to… restrictions (we couldn’t get a flight back from Catania on the east coast with our air miles), we had to drive diagonally across the whole island back to Palermo. Three-and-a-half hours. And I thought it would be dull. Like, all the charm of Newport Pagnell in the winter; like some drab, grey industrial wasteland. But it surprised. It’s hilly to the point of mountainous and exceptionally beautiful. Most of the mountains are volcanic and almost completely barren of green stuff. Making it a bit ‘other worldly’ but really magnificent. A great drive. Even though the dashboard on the car packed up half way there so I had no speedo. Nor the annoying little arrows telling me to change gear. Because in a Fiat 500 you’re always in a lower gear otherwise you’d never get there.

So there, that’s all you’re getting. I’m done with Sicily. Its history. Not Greco-Roman history (with a few Moors and Normans thrown in) but proper ‘done that, been there’ history. But good history. Fantastic place. Really loved it.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx