SICILY & TUNISIA - A SURPRISING TRIP

We had planned our trip to Sicily and Tunisia in a manner which left plenty of room for spontaneous decisions along the way depending on our impressions. The only certain elements were arrival in Palermo on April 25 and departure from same city on May 11. In between we intended to take the ferry from Palermo to Tunis, the rest was a blank page. I had rough guides to Sicily and Tunisia which proved to be of very little use and in the case of Tunisia should be called a mis-guide and taken off the market until a new edition can be prepared for post Arab Spring.

In the end we spent 3 days in and around Palermo, now known as “the big lemon” then  night ferry to Tunis, touring extensively in Tunisia, now known as “no country for old men (or old women)”  with 2 more nights in Palermo on the way back. 

PART I SICILY

We will definitely visit Sicily again and explore further afield. I think we now know Palermo quite thoroughly and really found it wonderfully atmospheric in its mostly dilapidated charm. 

Arrived at Palermo for breakfast...cannoli of course, messy but delicious.

Then we checked into Hotel Orientale, situated on one floor of a grand old  baroque palazzo on Via Maqueda,  built in the 18th century by an ancestor of Lampedusa.  The courtyard and beautiful staircase remain the same, somewhat dilapidated but still impressive, the hotel was rather faded and most of the rooms had been converted from larger spaces except the breakfast room which still had a peeling frescoed ceiling.
Our room looked down on the stable courtyard still being used as a stable for calèche horses, often accompanied by a few goats.

Time for lunch and fortunately one of the entrances to the Ballerò Street market was right next to the hotel. The market covers a large area of small streets in a multi- culti district which makes it buzz with people and foods from Sicily and far beyond, it became part of our usual walks, it operates 7 days a week.

 The street food was delicious; sarde a beccafico, sardines stuffed with nuts and anchovies; caponata, spicy aubergines, peperonata;  panelle, chickpea fritters; pizza fresh from huge old ovens; fish galore but especially tuna and swordfish;  lots of influence from North Africa with couscous dishes and sticky honey and nut pastries.We tried different foods everyday in the  market and chose a traditional trattoria for dinner in the evening, our favourite wine became Nero d’Avola, a deep dark red which was beautiful in the glass and on the palate. Needless to say we gorged on cannoli and Manfred enjoyed “corrected” coffee, caffe corretto, expresso with a dash of aqua dente, plenty of gelato was consumed along the way too, my favourite was al bacio,chocolate and hazelnut. 

 

 

On 2nd day we felt quite familiar with the city and walked to the botanical gardens, orto botánico,  which have been established in the same area since the late 18th century, 12.000 different species thrive in the sub -tropical micro climate, brought from all over the world over two centuries.

The  Ficus macrophylla  are particularly spectacular, originally from Australia, the Morteton Bay Fig, in fact we noticed examples in many public gardens around the coast.

 For a few years now the gardens have been home to a colony of parrots of the  species Psittacula krameri, having escaped from the avaries of the nearby Villa Giulia they are perfectly at home in the subtropical habitat of the gardens.

Another curiosity are the Magnolia Bombacaceae, strange trees from Brazil, huge bottle shapes, the trunks encrusted with lethal spikes.

 

A lovely cool walk under green fronds with the unlikely tropical swalk of parrots. 

In the afternoon we went by train to  Cefalú, a small town in a spectacular situation on the coast east of Palermo below craggy outcrops.

 Aleister Crowley the  looney occultist  spend some considerable time here in the 1920s. He and two mistresses converted a decrepit farmhouse  into the Abbey of Thelema where they shocked the locals with wild rites and rituals.

Crowley’s Cefalù period was one of the most prolific and happy of his life, even whilst suffering through drug addiction, he had to write the scandalous "Diary of a Drug Fiend" to finance his community. In 1922, the experience in monasticism ended when Raoul Loveday, a young disciple tragically died from typhoid fever after drinking spring water.

Crowley and his people were evicted by Mussolini who had no sympathy for either pornographic art or mysticism. Once the Abbey closed, the villagers whitewashed the erotic murals which they saw as demonic. This erased much of the history and work of Crowley. Afterwards, the house was considered haunted and remained abandoned until 1955, when Kenneth Anger,  an experimental filmmaker and the sexuality professor Alfred Kinsey located the ruins and attempted to restore the Chambre des Cauchemars (nightmare room). This helped to reveal the past of Crowley’s community, but the sudden death of Kinsey, who had financed the project, caused an abrupt halt to their efforts.

We felt no frissons of fear walking in the shadow of "the beast" but enjoyed a leisurely walk around the pretty port and visited the massive Norman duomo, a much more rewarding experience than the cathedral in Palermo which is the same 12th century date but has been renovated repeatedly over the centuries and has lost its pure lines.

We spent a long time trudging along the port trying to unravel the mysteries of the ferry crossings to Tunis as we preferred to leave  from Trapani rather than Palermo, despite info on the web it proved that this was no longer possible so we booked the tickets for the night ferry for the following day and went to Trapani anyway by bus.

Of course we also visited Erice, ancient Eryx, a site of mystic cults and the  main reason for the establishment of Trapani as a port in 400 b.c. It has a spectacular site above Trapani and can be reached by cable car, not on the day we visited as it was too windy, we took the bus instead which was an amazing ride, winding around the abrupt hillside behind Trapani. Erice is well worth a visit because of its amazing situation but the village itself  has a melancholy feel with many of the houses clad in grim grey cement render. The Romans dedicated the town to Venus and the temple of Venus was a reference point for seamen and pilgrims of the Mediterranean  guided by the holy fire that the acolytes of Venus kept burning.  Apparently sailors came to give tribute to Venus by favouring the young priestesses with their macho charms. On the remains of this temple, in the XIth , the Normans built Castilo de Venere which can be visited.

Trapani has a similar  history to many places on the coast of Sicily, founded by Elymians, conquered by Carthaginians, Romans, Vandals, Ostrogoths, Byzantines, Muslims and in 1077 by Normans let by Roger I.

 It flourished as an important port and had a role in the crusades. By the 17^th century it had declined due to revolts, plagues, and famines, but in the following century it grew rich through  trade and was  largely re- developed in the  baroque style. The old town we see today is tightly packed along a narrow peninsular, elegantly graceful in the centre with many traces of the more ancient past in the fortifications and harbour buildings.



One more day in Palermo before getting the ferry at to Tunis at 1.00 a.m. 
We visited the Palazzo dei Normandii and the stupendous mosiacs in the Capella Palatina.
The palace was originally built for the Arab emirs and their harems in the 9th century, on a site earlier occupied by Roman and Punic fortresses.
Eventually abandoned by the Arabs, the palace was fully restored by the conquering Normans. The Palatine Chapel was completed by the Norman king Roger II in 1140.
The mosaiced interior is capped by a splendid 10th-century Arab honeycomb stalactite wooden ceiling, painted with biblical stories as well as scenes of Arab and Norman court life, including animal hunts, dances and a picnic in a harem.
After the Normans left, the palace fell into serious decay until it was renovated by Spanish viceroys in 1555.

The churches of Palermo cover the whole of christian history with many beautiful examples of Arab/Norman design. There was an enormous surge of building chrurches and palazzi during the baroque period not due to the 1693 earthquake which only effected eastern Sicily but in Palermo it was a last gasp of opulence before the absentee aristocracy crashed into bankrupcy due to mismanagement of their vast estates while they were enjoying court life in the city.
Our favourite churches were the ancient ones with Byzantine domes and simple interiors. 

San Giovanni degli Eremitii is a charming gem with its dramatic red domes and surrounded by a lush garden of palms, citrus, aromatic flowering shrubs and vines. The original 6th century church was converted into a mosque in the 9th century but became a Christian church again in 1136 during the reign of the Norman king Roger II and entrusted to Benedictine monks.



The cloister is the best preserved part of the ancient monastery, it has elegantly slender double columns with capitals decorated by vegetable motifs supporting ogival arches. It also includes an Arab cistern.


Santa Maria dell’Ammiraglio ( La Martorana) and the Church of San Cataldo are in Piazza Bellini. By the way there is a good trattoria in the corner with a splendid view of both churches, particularly striking at night, the pizza is good too.
La Martorana was commissioned in 1143 by George of Antioch, an admiral in the fleet of Roger II, hence the name dell’ Ammiraglio. The church was Greek Orthodox but became Roman catholic in the 13th century. The same mosaic craftsmen who were brought from Byzantium to create the Capella Palatina at the Palazzo Normanii and the Duomo at Cefalu were employed here. Unfortunately many of the mosaics were removed in the 17th century to be replaced by baroque frescoes. The surviving mosaics are amongst the most impressive ever to have been created in Sicily, especially the portrait of Roger II being crowned by Christ. A wonderful campanile is a fine example of Norman-Arab architecture.

Standing next to La Martorana is the miniscule church of San Cataldo, characterised by its three red domes. It was built in 1154 and has retained its original ascetic atmosphere perfectly. The only decoration to speak of is the original marble mosaic floor . It is presently the religious seat of the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre in Palermo.

Off to Tunisia! A difficult time to fill until the 1a.m. sailing especially dragging our bags around, no left luggage open at that time in the morning. Found a trattoria near the port and tried to make dinner last as long as possible but it was a busy place and the service was too fast for once, lots of nefarious goings on among the clientele, some really dubious characters straight out of central casting for a Sicillian crime movie, let’s not even whisper THAT M word. At one point a huge motorbike roared up, leather clad guy dashed in and thrust an enormous lemon into the hands of the louche owner sitting behind a desk in the corner, not a word was said…Palermo will be remembered as “the big lemon” from now on.

Finally on the boat, Zeus Palace, loading took ages, hundreds of Sicily’s Tunisian population returning home for visits with ancient cars, vans, pick-ups packed to alarming heights with a huge selection of household goods including kitchen sinks. A nightcap brandy in the bar revealed an expanse of Tunisians all tucked up for the night on every single sofa and spilling on to the floor and out to the passageways and up and down the stair landings, stepping over sleeping forms we found our cabin and felt very spoilt.

OUR TUNISIAN ADVENTURES COMING UP SOON.