Sicily, Italy

Monreale and Segesta Sicily

Getting a rental car at Palermo airport was supposed to be easy. We left our B&B in Palermo early enough to enjoy a coffee and bun at a cafe near the bus stop. Then thinking we had lots of time we had another drink instead of rushing to get the 8:45 AM bus. That was when we experienced our second demonstration in Trapani. Nevertheless we were not much later arriving at the airport than we anticipated. Getting the car was a different story. Maybe it was because a plane load of people came at the same time and 90% of them got the same car rental deal as we did from Thrifty. In any case we joined a long line and one hour later we had the keys to our rental car.

Ray had purchased European maps for his portable GPS and they worked. I managed not to get us lost driving part way back to Palermo and up a hill to visit the church and monastery complex of Monreale.

We arrived at noon, just in time to park the car and visit Duomo Santa Maria La Nuova before it closed between 12:45 and 3 PM. The church, built around 1172 by William II, the grandson of Richard II, who built the Cappela Palentino in Palermo. William had a dream that told him to build a church to rival all the churches in Europe and outshine the beauty of his grandfather’s church in Palermo. Sufficient money to build the church would be found in a secret place where his father had hidden a large sum many years before. The result was similar to the Palentino with colourful mosaics on gold leaf background covering the interior but truly grander than the chapel we had admired in Palermo the previous day.

After lunch at a nearby restaurant, we visited the Cloisters of a Benedictine Monastery connected to the Duomo. The cloisters for a large square surrounded by delicately carved and decorated Romanesque columns with a small fountain enclosed in one corner. There was a Royal Palace connected to the complex but the remains were not open to the public. Behind the cloisters was a terrace with views over Palermo and the Gulf of Palermo.

It was 3 PM before we were on our way to Segesta, 60 km away, just off the main highway on the west coast, directly on our route to Trapani. We arrived about 4 PM and parked near the famous temple. Scholars say it was part of a city probably founded by the Elimi people, one of three indigenous people of Sicily, under Greek sponsorship in the 5 th C BC. The city seems to have been abandoned in the 13th C AD. Archaeologists have uncovered many of the buildings that once covered the top of a hill overlooking the sea. We walked a short distance up a hill to see a rectangular building surrounded by 36 huge columns on a base 21 by 54 M that have survived several attacks and the elements almost intact. It was impressive. Much is unknown about the temple’s purpose, including the deity to which it would have been dedicated or whether it was ever really completed. There is more to see at the site.

We bought bus tickets to take a 2 km ride to the top of Mount Barbaro where archaeologists have been busy. In addition to the temple we had seen, there were ruins of later buildings, mainly a large Agora, or meeting place, a palace, a small Christian church, a mosque, a huge council meeting place. The largest ruin at the top of the hill was a Roman theatre built in the 3rd C BC. A perfect semicircle with a diameter of 63 M, it gives a beautiful view of the countryside and coastline. We got almost the last bus down to the parking lot as the site is closed one hour before sunset.

We got to Trapani and parked in the first spare parking spot we could find near the port. Then we got our rolly bags out and walked into town searching for the small street where our B&B Bella Trapani was located. We met our manager who showed us our small, simple suite on the ground floor of a typical apartment building. We had a bedroom, bath and small kitchenette. We were told not to leave the car where we were parked as it would turn out to be very expensive. We walked back to find that a ticket had been left on the windshield, luckily just a warning. The drove around several streets searching for free parking and found the best spot for was a free lot about a 10 minute walk from our B&B. By the time we returned from parking the car, it was time to find a restaurant for dinner. Our manager’s suggestion for B&B A Casa Mia, facing the harbour, was great.