From chaos to quiet sophistication.
Back to Catania to a house hotel room up three flights of stairs! My room is called the Silk Road, evidently the famous or infamous trade route passed through Sicilian ports. In the 1300's it was responsible for spreading the Black Plague from Asia into Europe resulting in the deaths of 50 million people! The room is quirky and I love the old tiled mosaics around the sink.
I head out to find somewhere to eat and pass the beautiful artisan shops and wish I could carry more home with me. The glass cannoli are kitsch and amazing! Little carts selling pomegranate juice are so colourful.
I come across a restaurant in a little square with a buffet for 6 euro and I add stuffed squid to the men, it's amazing. The night is balmy and dark by now. The waiters so professional and attentive. A blue eyed blonde English girl is sitting across from me and I venture to ask if she also is a solo female traveller and she tells me her tale. She's a dancer on a ship and she was coming here with her boyfriend and they broke up just before they were due to leave so she decided to come alone. She's loving it and the waiters are extra attentive around her table.
Next morning early I hit the markets to check out on the autumn produce before leaving. The smell of roasted capsicums, white sweet onions and eggplant fill the air. The old men are leaning over the balcony watching the theatre of the seafood market below. Noise and hustle, shouting and bargaining fill the air. If Caravaggio were here, he'd feel at home, he'd just wonder about the choice of clothes. The medieval feels are everywhere in this town that Mt Etna has overlooked since it's birth.
In the afternoon, I'm off to the airport and Modena to catch up with the daughter. Upon arrival at Bologna, all the trains have been changed so it's tricky to re-do my ticket but the man at the counter guesses I'm Australian and we become best friends and it's all fixed. His Uncle lives in Melbourne and he hopes to go one day. It seems most Italians have a relative residing in Australia. To them, it's the promised land as Italy is for me. Further fields are always greener.
I find out I'm staying in a slightly illegal place . A man meets me at eight and shows me into my room which feels a bit odd as there's no one else in the place but at least there's a lock on the door. It's an old converted apartment with two rooms and it's done up in an old fashioned way with a bowl of clementines on the table. But the next day when I cook up a meal in the kitchen and invite my daughter and her friend for lunch and the owner turns up, he's furious because I'm not supposed to have visitors. Some antiquated Italian ruling he tells me or he's probably just not paying tax. Fair enough.
It's full on autumn gear here. In Sicily, we were still in our summer clothes but Modena has made a huge shift to winter garments and I have none with me. When I go for coffee, people are in quilted coats, scarves, jeans and boots. I shall have to shop, I'm getting some strange looks.
That night we celebrate my late husband's birthday with a meal at the cheaper version of the very expensive Francescana 59 for 50 euro a head. It's beautiful and we have a starter of hazelnut savoury mousse with parmesan froth, a tiny potion of trout with a sun dried tomato paste, burnt capsicum soup and other delicacies. We have a long walk back home and are grateful for it after consuming 7 courses.
I have one more wander through Modena on my last day, enjoying the coloured porticoes, the piazza, the weekend antique markets as the next time I come here it will be to help the daughter move all her things back to Auronzo after Uni finishes. It's a bitter sweet parting as I've loved this elegant town.
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