Wednesday 15th June - Mount Pelligrino, Palermo, Sicily

I'd seen it on a walking blog, checked it on Maps.Me, and as the ship docked last night, we saw it from our balcony.  Mount Pelligrino.

At 1,970 feet, it's not really a big mountain but it dominates the port.  You can drive up it, or if you are feeling slightly nuts, like we were, you could walk up the path used by the pilgrims visiting the chapel devoted to Santa Rosalia at the top 

We knew it was going to be hot, so we didn't expect to be able to get to the top, but we thought we'd see how far we could go, so after breakfast, we left the ship at about 9.45 (we never rush anywhere), and turned right out the port.  

We'd sort of been warned by Hazel, the port lecturer, who said in her lecture that if you turned right it could be a bit "gritty".  And it was.  Lots of rubbish piled up on the streets, manic cars with loud complaining horns, push bikes and mopeds everyhere, and the streets and buildings a little tatty and run down. There were trees full of purple flowers though, and their perfume sat on top of the warm busy smell of the city.

It was a mile and three quarters, or 45 minutes walking,  to get from the ship to the bottom of the hill, but there it was, exactly as described in the walking blog I'd read last night.

 

The path is paved or cobbled all the way up, making for an easy route, which it needed to be in the heat. The sun was already high, and we were grateful for the shade offered by the occasional tree.

It really was hot going, and constant breaks were needed.  Bodhan, the pianist on the ship, overtook us  on his mountain bike. 

And we loved it.  The countryside around us was varied and interesting with trees, plants and cactiiT the odd lizard crossed our path and the views were stunning.

We'd already decided that we'd walk until 12.30.  No matter where we were at that point, we'd take a take a break, eat the fruit we'd brought from the ship, and then go back.  At 12.30, with the brow of a hill just ahead I persuaded Peter to go just a tiny bit further.  And I was pleased I had, we'd reached a point where we could see over the other side, and Sferracavallo, a port town on the other side. 

Sferracavallo

 

We rested under the shade of the tree, where a passing Sicillian family stopped to say Hi.  They were curious about the mad English people on a ship who just suddenly decided to climb the hill. 

As expected, going down was much easier, and also much faster.  Much faster in fact than we'd calculated.  We had gone through a lot of water though, and were not looking forward to the walk back through town, expecting it to be a bit of a slog.  It was.  But buyin a couple of ice cold bottles of water from a shop we passed, and guzzling them within minutes sort of made it a little better. 

We were back at the ship by 3, well in time for Covid testing, so a quick cold shower was in order before heading to the Living Room for cold drinks and cookies. 

The rest of the day's highlights included Peter throwing icecream all over himself, the Crew Show, which was OK, and popping in to Joanne who was playing piano in the supper club.

Cagliari (pronounced Cal-i-arr-i) tomorrow, and more heat.  Peter seems to have a vague memory that he liked the place, so I'm looking forward to it.