Dramatic view from the perched Taormina takes in parts of the winding road we drove to get to the town, plus a little of the Mediterranean.

We instructed our GPS to lead us to Taormina’s ancient Greek theater, figuring this would take us to parking within walking distance of the theater and other points of interest.

The Greek theater in Taormina, one of the top reason tourists visit the town — besides the town’s dramatic hilltop setting at the sea’s edge. Audience members in this theater, which has new seating for modern usage, can see the volcano, Mount Etna, in the distance.

However, we hadn’t realized that much of the city’s touristic area was pedestrianized. The GPS tried to send us right down a pedestrian-only street, but we had to turn away. This got us lost and then stuck in a cul de sac with absolutely no discernible way to turn around.

The other exit, in front of us, was stair steps. Oops.

Fortunately, a local driver appeared and offered to help. There was a parking lot behind us that we could not access because of a barricade (a pole with a lock). Our rescuer had the key and he removed the pole.

He backed our car into the parking lot, turned it around there, backed it out into the cul de sac, leaving the car pointed in the correct direction to make an exit.

He directed us to a perfectly located parking lot.

The Piazza IX Aprile, part of the pedestrian-only access route to Taormina’s Greek theater. The walking street, called Corso Umberto I, is a popular shopping area for visitors.

Santa Caterina church, left, and the Palazzo Carvaja, also on the pedestrianized route to Taormina’s Greek theater. Our GPS would have sent us right into this no-car zone.

Brightly colored fruit stand seen along Corso Umberto I in Taormina.

This adventure occurred about half way into a nine-day trip to Sicily, off the boot of Italy. The three of us had picked up our prebooked Budget rental car at the Palermo airport (FYI, there were scads of rental companies at the terminal).

We had some road maps but relied heavily on a cellphone GPS program. Nevertheless, we made mistakes, as above.

Furthermore, driving in Sicily’s hilltop towns really concentrates the mind.

I recall, for example, when we had trouble getting out of a tight spot — in Piazza Armerina, a hill town in the middle of Sicily.

Our accommodation, on a tiny piazza of sorts, was accessible by driving through an alarmingly narrow passage framed by stone walls, followed by a sharp right turn.

A difficult-to-navigate area in Piazza Armerina. The car seen above is driving through the narrow passage that we remember well. A woman stepped out of her house to help us maneuver our vehicle in order to enter this passage without causing damage.

Partial view of our compact car at right. It stands in front of the apartment where my friends and I stayed in Piazza Armerina. Photo by Judy Lemberger.

Exiting our little square proved more difficult. The car had to make a wide arc for the left turn. A woman stepped out of her house to direct us into this tiny passage.

Then, things got tougher. Leaving town (en route to the third/fourth century Villa Romana) meant dealing with awfully sharp turns and steep downward passages.

We missed one of those downward V-shaped left turns and found ourselves at a high-altitude dead end, essentially someone’s driveway, with a nasty cliffside drop behind us. Getting out of there involved a hair-raising turn-around adjacent to said driveway.

Much-loved Roman-era mosaic of women athletes dressed in what look like modern bikinis. This is part of an astonishing collection of mosaics at the third/fourth century Villa Romana a few miles outside Piazza Armerina.

A scene from the largest mosaic at the Villa Romana. The mosaic extended the length of a corridor about 180 feet long and illustrated the capture of wild animals to bring to Rome.

Tourists taking in the preserved mosaics at the Villa Romana. We drove through and overnighted at Piazza Armerina to be in position for an early-morning visit to the villa, ahead of the crowds.

Also, our GPS failed us once. We confirmed that it was programmed correctly to take us to the Monreale Duomo just outside of Palermo. But it delivered us, through the most congested traffic of our trip, to a different church in an iffy part of Palermo.

So we dropped the car at the airport (planned for that day anyway) and I later used a tour bus to see Monreale’s cathedral. See https://besttripchoices.com/my-travel-corner/sicily-the-mosaics-of-monreale/ for more on that.

My last anecdote is a lot funnier in hindsight. At Agrigento, in southern Sicily, we left our car in a parking lot adjacent to the Valley of the Temples.

This lot, dotted with trees, looked to be a repurposed orchard. Ropes served as partitions. But, there was an automated entry-and-exit system. Machines spit out timed parking tickets; customers paid parking fees to a human when about to depart, then fed the stamped tickets into the machines before exiting.

When we wanted to leave, the system was not working, but no one would (or could?) permit customers holding paid-up tickets to depart.

Several cars waited so long that they were in the lot past the time they had paid for. So, the guy who collected parking fees started asking for more money from customers who had been trapped!

This triggered a screaming fight. When the machines were fixed, or disabled, we left. No one had to fork over more money.

Temple of Concord at the Valley of the Temples at Agrigento. This temple is the model for the UNESCO logo.

Above and below, two views of the Temple of Hera at the Valley of the Temples at Agrigento.

We paid for parking at several sightseeing locations, but in most cases, we snagged hotels that included free parking.

This did not always mean convenient parking. At a couple of hill towns (Cefalu and Erice), we were instructed in advance to park in specific places, then were picked up and driven to our accommodations.

At this point, it may sound as if a driving tour of Sicily was a bad idea. Think again. We valued our options to stop on a whim or to tweak the itinerary as we went.

Our trio included someone who likes to drive, even in Italy, and who is steely cool in tight situations.

Hill towns we did not visit but could see from other hill towns. It’s easy to surmise why sometimes visitors are well advised to park their cars before reaching the center of a Sicilian hill town. Above is Calascibetta seen from Enna. Below is Castelmola, visible from highest seats in the Greek theater at Taormina.

Although driving in hill towns could be tough or plain impossible, we had good roads elsewhere, including most of the winding mountain routes.

The total cost was good, too, even after adding on probably too much insurance and after paying Budget an exorbitant amount to top up the gas tank at the end (we couldn’t find a gas station near our drop-off point).

We had the car (a compact with standard shift) seven days (we did not need it in Palermo) and spent roughly $635 for rental, insurance, gas and parking, split three ways.

Best of all, locals were helpful, as anecdotes above illustrate. Others volunteered assistance with a malfunctioning parking kiosk and, later, at a self-service gas station.

Yes, Sicily was worth the drive.

For more about Sicily, we offer at BestTripChoices.com the following, under the headline: The Mafia and a mountain

https://besttripchoices.com/international-touring-areas/sicily-italy/

This blog is by Nadine Godwin, BestTripChoices.com editorial director and contributor to the trade newspaper, Travel Weekly. She also is the author of “Travia: The Ultimate Book of Travel Trivia.” Photos also are by Nadine Godwin except where otherwise indicated.

The post Sicily: Taking the wheel appeared first on Best Trip Choices.

On arrival in Palermo, my hotel’s manager, Giuseppe, recommended restaurants (it was lunchtime) and gave advice for getting to Monreale. He suggested skipping public transportation in favor of one of several bus services that carry tourists to and from Monreale a few miles south of the city.

I was traveling with two friends. They were more interested in lunch and in-town activities. I left them and, per Giuseppe’s advice, walked to a spot directly behind the city’s 11^th century Norman castle (now used by the Sicilian Parliament) looking for tour buses.

At least three companies provide regular tourist runs from central Palermo to Monreale. I bought a ticket (10 euros) for the first bus I found, which was set to leave soon. I was very lucky.

The Monreale-bound bus had only three passengers, plus driver and a hostess who provided some narration along the route.

My bus, like those operated by other travel companies, deposited its passengers at a point fairly close to the cathedral but with some uphill walking required (roughly 10 minutes) to the cathedral entry.

The town of Monreale and its cathedral are perched about a thousand feet above sea level. The walks to and from the church offered great views over the valley below (known for its fertility — almond, olive and orange trees) and, beyond that, the city of Palermo and its harbor.

View of Palermo and the Mediterranean Sea from the hilltop town of Monreale, Sicily.

My bus and the hostess stayed in place for one hour, which gave me 40 minutes inside and around the cathedral, after allowing for the 10-minute walks each way. That was not much time for a spectacular church interior, but I was glad to get there at all.

This was all about a Norman cathedral (with Arab and Byzantine influences, my guidebook and local printed materials said) that dates from the late 12^th century. The cathedral’s rather plain-looking front faced Piazza Guglielmo II, a charming square with the de rigueur outdoor cafes soaked in sunshine.

The Monreale Cathedral’s relatively plain-Jane front.

The Piazza Guglielmo II, site of the Monreale Cathedral.

Surprisingly, it was the cathedral’s backside, the apse exterior, that was showy. Blind arches were vivid and ornate because builders used inlay techniques with marble and tufa of various colors to good effect.

Decorative exterior of the Monreale Cathedral apse.

But the inside! Enter and let your jaw drop.

Here were 6,400 square meters, or more than 68,000 square feet, of mosaics covering every surface of the interior, meaning all of the surfaces above the marble (maybe 10 feet high) that lined the walls from the floor up.

Builders used the mosaics to tell Biblical stories in bright-colored glass pieces. The figures were set against a gold background (meaning gold leaf on glass). The Old Testament stories were featured in the nave, with stories of Christ’s life in the aisles and transept.

Above and below, stories from the Old Testament depicted in thousands of square feet of mosaics.

But, the gold was particularly vivid in the apse, meaning the space around and encompassing the altar. I paid the 2.50 euros to visit this extraordinary section. This was my only on-site expense. Entry to the cathedral was free, and I did not have time for more options that involved fees, such as walking around on the top of the roof for the views or finding the cloister and its gardens.

In the apse, there was a huge mosaic of Christ (the Christ Pantocrator, meaning Ruler of All) overhead and, below that, mosaics of numerous disciples and saints.

Mosaic of the Christ Pantocrator, the centerpiece in the apse in the Monreale Cathedral.

A closer look at the disciples and saints depicted below and to the sides of the Christ Pantocrator in the apse at the Monreale Cathedral.

This was the same setup as I had seen previously at the cathedral in another nearby town, Cefalu. In fact, both cathedrals are part of the same UNESCO-protected group, called “Arab-Norman Palermo and the Cathedral Churches of Cefalu and Monreale.”

Monreale’s cathedral ceiling and beams were gilded wood.

The Monreale Cathedral’s golden mosaic-covered apse plus details of the decorative ceiling over the choir.

Sights also included the tombs of two Norman kings of Sicily, William I and William II. In accompanying signage, they were identified as William the Bad and William the Good, respectively. Also, their tombs were a dark reddish brown and creamy white, respectively.

Inside the Monreale Cathedral, the tomb of Sicily’s King William I, aka William the Bad.

I spent much of my 40 minutes inside the cathedral, trying to see as many of the figures as possible, and really would have loved to walk into the cloister. I saved a few minutes to walk around the very decorative back of the church before returning to the bus.

Two of the scores of scenes portrayed in mosaics inside the Monreale Cathedral.

Overall view of the cathedral sanctuary showing how comprehensively the interior has been covered with mosaics.

For my return to Palermo, the bus left at its appointed time. The operator’s flyer said the company (ProntoBus Sicilia) takes two buses to Monreale each day, one in the morning plus my afternoon journey. But the on-board hostess said the afternoon run was the only one.

Whatever the truth, it was a clear case of dumb luck that I showed up about 20 minutes before this firm’s only afternoon departure.

On the day of my visit, two other tour companies dropped passengers in the hill town at about the same time: CitySightseeing Palermo and Open ArTour Palermo. To save me, when I try researching Palermo-Monreale transportation options, I cannot find an Internet site that lists these companies. However, it is easy to find info about the public buses.

I was hungry after my lunch-free outing, so grabbed a gelato to prevent starvation, but was really up for a nice dinner.

Which brings me to one of our hotelier’s recommended restaurants. It was called Il Mirto e La Rosa, and it was a short walk from our lodgings. The interior featured high arches with books and (fake) roses hanging from them. It did not disappoint, serving up one of many good meals in Sicily (fish and pasta this time) with Sicilian wine. This was one very busy restaurant, too.

Interior of Palermo’s Il Mirto e LaRosa restaurant with books and (fake) roses hanging from the ceiling.

For more about Sicily, we offer at BestTripChoices.com the following, under the headline: The Mafia and a mountain

https://besttripchoices.com/international-touring-areas/sicily-italy/

This blog and photos are by Nadine Godwin, BestTripChoices.com editorial director and contributor to the trade newspaper, Travel Weekly. She also is the author of “Travia: The Ultimate Book of Travel Trivia.”

The post Sicily: The mosaics of Monreale appeared first on Best Trip Choices.