Sicily, Day 7

We are in Venice at the moment but have had no Internet service for two days...frustrating because I knew that I was getting behind in the blog posts... For those that are waiting for the full history about Joe's parents: Each day I have been adding to the story because Joe starts to tell me more and more interesting facts each time I ask him to clarify a date. Here's a sample of this morning's conversation:

Me: " So how long did your father court your mother"?

Joe: "I'm not sure...remember, this was an 'arranged' marriage. (What???... An arranged marriage?) You never mentioned that this was an arranged marriage".

Joe: "You have to understand." (Now follow me now...) "Everyone in this town in Sicily was either a Tropea or a Bruno"... Okay. "My father's mother was a sister to my mother's brother".

Me: (laughing.... big huge belly-laughs, tears-streaming-out-eyes type of laughing....trying to absorb what Joe has just said): "Let me get this right...your father's mother was a sister to your mother's brother"?

Joe: "Yes, but don't mention that in the blog because then everyone will know why I am the way that I am". (I eliminated the four letter descriptive word).

Me, MJ, & Dickle: Absolute Hysteria.

 

That was a tease for the the story which I will finish and post when I can...

 

In the meantime, here are pictures from the lasts couple of days at my brother's vineyard home in Castiglione, Sicily, located on the northern slope of Mt. Etna (not the side where the current lava flows are going)...

 

Piazza at Zaffron

 

My brother Bud, Lourdes & MJ

 

MJ

John & Joe

Catania, Sicily: Reconnecting Families!

Joe, Simon, Dick, MJ

Yesterday was a travel day...for Dick & I it was an early morning flight from Paris to Rome. During our time in Paris I managed to decipher many of the French words .....despite my notoriously poor grades in high school French....but the check-in machines at the airport were another story. (I think this experience was Dick Bartholomew's secret way of getting back at me for not studying well enough to get decent grades way back when! He was my high school teacher who often shook his head at my lack of effort back ...) Yes, you could push the buttons to translate to English but making sure you were at the right machine in the right portion of the terminal was really the challenge! Thankfully Air France has some exceptionally nice employees who graciously steered us in the direction of the right machines!

At any rate, we took the two-hour flight from Paris to Rome and hooked up with MJ & Joe, and friends, Fran & John. They had flown all night from Washington, DC, and arrived, as everyone does after such a long flight, exhausted and bedraggled! But no rest for the weary because it was time for another flight to Catania, Sicily... Luckily we had made arrangements for "Simon" to pick us up from the airport and transport us to Hotel Una in downtown Catania. (This is the only standard type of hotel that we will be staying at during this trip... We can figure out when the trip is over whether this has been a good decision or not, but so far we have been really pleased with the private apartment rentals arranged through Air B&B).

Weary Travelers

Figuring out how to unlock the door

Fast forward a couple of hours... My brother and his wife live in Catania, as do Joe's cousins. We had asked them to meet us last evening at the hotel and being the good drinkers we are we ended up meeting one another at the rooftop bar... It was a delightful gathering that was really unplanned. We got to meet Joe's family; they got to meet mine. Fran & John got to meet everybody! Some spoke the old Catania dialect which is apparently very different from Italian; some did not. So we spent the evening reconnecting, nodding, smiling, talking with our hands and saying "si, si" ..and drinking!

My brother "Bud ", myself, Lourdes, Dick

 

This was the first time seeing my brother in about 15 years, and the first time meeting his lovely wife!

 

 

Dick, Joe & MJ enjoying pizza in one if the town squares..

The story about Joe's parents tomorrow... Ciao!

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Paris Day 5... The Louvre

(I am getting behind with my posts because we have now traveled on to Italy and will be spending the next day or two here in Sicily. i started the post below before we left France but never got a chance to finish it and get it posted... so forgive us if the pucs are posted without explanation or captions...)

One cannot see Paris in a month, never mind in five days, so visits to museums were brief and to the point...catch the major "must see's" and then move on to the next. Four or five hours was enough time for us at one stretch... espcially for Dick's recovering back. Seats in the museums are few and far between, and the sheer crowd numbers have bordered on being oppressive. It is, after all, May which is the start of Europe's busy tourist season. (Everyone, including us...wants to come before the heat of the summer! Lord knows Neither Dickle nor I are fans of heat!)

We have discovered on this trip that it takes us a good thirty minutes to get into the main reception area, find an English map; rent audio sets; orient ourselves and then swim like fish upstream through the seas of people! The first Sundays of the month are free admission for everyone at most Paris museums. That was yesterday. We thought that because this was a Monday that the crowds would less than what we found at the d'Orsay the day before. Silly us! The Louvre is the largest and most visited museum in the world! Like the Palace at Versailles, the crowds had to number in the tens of thousands, and lines in front of the most popular items like our girl Mona were long and deep!

Most of the museums had "No Pictures" signage that virtually everyone ignored. I would imagine that years ago cameras were easy things for guards to spot and to govern but in this day and age of iPads and cell phones, all of which have cameras, it is almost impossible to prevent snapping a picture. Most of us rule-breakers nixed the use of flashes which puts one tiny step above those that did. The Louvre surprisingly allowed non-flash pictures but it meant that lots of visitors assuming their typical hand-on-their-hip FB stance being photographed next to a Greek or Roman statue! Whatever! Just get outta my way so I can snap my picture of the painting!

 

 

 

 

 

No clue who she is!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not your typical air mattress!

 

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Paris Day 4 - Part 2 Muse d'Orsay

One of the things we did before we left home was to purchase two-Day online tickets for the Paris Museums...Smarter than we realized because these special advance tickets allowed us to bypass very long lines to get in...(With the exception of Versailles...) there weren't enough days or time to get into but two in the city, but they might have been the most important, at least to us. The first was the Muse d'Orsay which, according to sources, houses the best general collection in the world of Monet, Renoir, Degas, and more.

 

 

 

Some butt-head's butt posted for posterity! She would not move so the ten people standing behind cameras (including us,) could take a picture of the museum sign. Wish I knew her name & if she was on FB...I'd post this sucker & tag her!

 

Love the ceilings in there!

 

 

 

One of those creative, panoramic shots Dick took inside...

 

More of Monet's Work...

 

 

We didn't get there this trip but this is a picture of Monmartre and the white domes of Sacre-Coeur as seen from one of the upper doors of the d'Orsay Museum. I think the buildings in the foreground are that of the Lourve.

Awesome, even from a distance....

A lot for one day...headed home, or back to our apartment via train. No need for a car if you live here!

Gardens & Walking Paths Surrounding the Eiffel Tower

 

Aw shucks...we have to walk around the Eiffel Tower to get 'home'...what a drag!

 

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