Bed and Breakfast Reality Check

Today your editor was pressed into service by his doorman to translate for a young English woman who was staying at a bed and breakfast in the 18th century building that houses our offices.

The woman, who was around 25, was traveling alone. She had found "Maria's" ad online. She arrived in Palermo, met Maria and her husband, and "checked in." The apartment was not part of Maria's house but a separate unit. So far so good.

The second evening, the English girl was disturbed by a man and woman entering the apartment unannounced, opening the door with a key. This was an older guy with a girl who seemed like his younger mistress. Whatever...

In any event, the man was very annoyed to find the young English woman there, and complained to Maria. The English girl spent the last night of her stay in a hotel.

The lesson is to be very careful in this unregulated field in Sicily. See our Sicily bed and breakfast article for solid advice.

Best of Sicily Books

In cooperation with our partner, Trinacria Editions of New York, we'll be publishing several books over the next twelve months - everything from history to cooking.

Founded some years ago in Palermo, Trinacria has published books (in Italian) on a wide range of subjects and will continue to do so. The American venture marks the beginning of their publishing in English.

As it involves more than a single title dedicated to Sicily, this program eclipses those of other travel sites and represents a diversification for Best of Sicily and, of course, an advantage for readers. All of these books will be available as e-books as well as traditional paper ones.

New Sicily Travel Ebook

Available for Kindle and Android, Tim Cawkwell's travel book gives impressions of an encounter with some of Sicily's famous sites, such as Monreale, Palermo, Segesta, Trapani, Scopello (Erice is shown here). But it is more than a travel book, since these encounters prompt wider reflections on the pleasures to be found in history, on the torments of the Mafia presence, on the idea of the Englishman abroad, and on Sicily as an 'island of the mind'.

The journey takes in Giuseppe Di Lampedusa's The Leopard, Roberto Rossellini's film Journey to Italy, Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris, Gavin Maxwell's Ten Pains of Death, Peter Robb's Midnight in Sicily, the photographs of Letizia Battaglia, ER Dodds's The Greeks and the Irrational. The essay takes as its framework the way a visit to Sicily healed Tim Cawkwell's diagnosis as suffering from inflamed arteries in the head. This leads finally to a consideration of Beethoven's last five piano sonatas heard throughout the visit as consolatory and healing.

This essay, which includes a number of photographs as illustrations, is an arresting mixture of the factual and the thought-provoking. Although Sicily in all its richness and pleasures is the immediate subject, Tim Cawkwell ranges beyond the geographical island to touch on profound questions about human existence. www.bit.ly/Neuralgistan

Sicily Tours and Excursions

There are all kinds of ways to see Sicily, and right now is "high" season for visiting. Our main Sicily tour page offers plenty of scheduled tours around the island. We also offer regular excursions from Palermo. That includes most of western Sicily (shown is Monreale Cathedral.)

Personalized itineraries are available from Sicily Concierge.

To ensure that your request for a personalized service can be accommodated, please send it at least three weeks in advance of the date you have in mind. In the last few weeks we've had to turn down requests for services on certain dates in April that were heavily reserved.

A reminder that April 25th and May 1st are national holidays when banks, schools and some stores will be closed in Italy.

Genealogy in Sicily

We get a lot of requests involving Sicilian genealogical research. The subjects of Sicilian genealogy and family history are covered on several pages of Best of Sicily. Specific pages are also dedicated to related topics such as surname histories and heraldry (coats of arms).

However, we do not engage in genealogical research, though we can sometimes recommend a competent genealogist - depending on where in Sicily you require research and what kind of records you need researched. Incidentally, those we occasionally recommend are not necessarily the ones you find with web searches, while some websites on the subject present flawed information. Ours at least has the virtue of being accurate; it won't mislead you.

Wine Tastings in Palermo

Sicily's traditional wine country is in the island's western region, with its "capital" at Marsala, and it extends to the area around Palermo. There are, of course, fine wineries in other parts of Sicily, and nobody has a monopoly on great cuisine.

Our last post overlooked wine tastings in Palermo. Most of the establishments mentioned can arrange a wine tasting for a small group, and Filippo Testa's rural estate is a working winery. Sicily Concierge can plan a wine tasting as part of a personalized tour of Sicily, and some of the Best of Sicily tours include winery visits - and tastings.

These certainly aren't the only services of this kind available in Sicily, but we can vouch for their high standard of expertise and attention to detail. If you're seeking an objective experience, a "non-commercial" tasting may be preferable to one sponsored by a winery promoting its own wines.

Unfortunately, over the last few years we've seen a mad rush to market culinary services like cooking classes and wine tastings by any Sicilian capable of wielding a fork and a corkscrew! We've been advocating for quality services since 1999, and we'll continue to do so.

What's cooking in Sicily?

Here are a few ideas for cooking classes this year.

The Palermo cooking class is convenient if you're in the historic part of the city. Another local option is Vincenzo Clemente's market cooking class in Palermo's Via Libertà shopping district.

If you'd like an excursion into the Wine Country then the Sicilian cookery class near Alcamo is a great idea. It's about as rural as you can get. In Taormina, we suggest the rustic cooking class.

All personalized and all exceptional, and the sites we've linked to present details about pricing and reservations.

Rite of Spring

The focus of this month's Sicily Magazine is Spring. This includes the seasonal cuisine, of course, but also the places to visit. Two that capture our attention are Segesta (shown), which noasts the best-preserved Greek temple, and Ficuzza, a forest preserve around the Bourbons' royal hunting lodge erected in the English style two centuries ago.

At Ficuzza, a great place to sample local country cuisine is the Antica Stazione, an old railway station, built in 1886 and recently restored - the railroad tracks no longer exist. The Stazione is now a restaurant and inn. They may offer a few of the delights on our Sicily food page. Worth a visit if you're in the area.

Sicily Concierge offers personalized excursions to these destinations and others, and Segesta in included in our weekly Sicily tours.

Easter Time

This year the Spring time change falls on Easter. More precisely, early Easter morning, when Europe sets the time ahead by one hour. Keep this in mind if you're traveling in Sicily this weekend. And... Happy Easter!

Easter in Sicily 2013

It's early this year, on March 31st.

Easter in Sicily is a magical experience. The Passion Processions on Good Friday are especially interesting. Our favourite is the one at Erice, a hilltop town of gray stone houses and streets redolent of Jerusalem's that was already standing in biblical times.

Another interesting event is Mass at the Byzantine Rite churches, especially Palermo's Martorana, built as a Greek Orthodox Church in the twelfth century.

It's a great time to visit, and taste an almond marzipan lamb.

St Joseph's Day 19 March

This year it coincides with the arrival of a new Pope, but St Joseph's day is always worthy of note.

Heralding the arrival of Spring, it gives us an excuse to indulge in sfinci. Read about this delightful treat.

It's also the ideal season to visit Sicily. Check out our Sicily tours for 2013.

Satellites and Rebels

The Italian national government has agreed with the Sicilian regional one that construction of the American MUOS installation should be stopped pending further study, and issued an order to that effect. (We discussed this in a January post.)

This question should be studied further but - speaking more generally - Italy is moving into a political phase that will not improve the economy or the country's international position over the next few years. The point of the MUOS debate is that a responsible NATO nation should consider its decisions before it signs an international agreement, and it should be consistent from year to year.

With the rebels of the 5-Star Movement seated in the national parliament, we can look forward to a crippling impasse at every legislative step. Debate is good, but if Italy leaves NATO or the euro (as some in the 5-Star Movement propose), her status as - at least until now - one of the world's ten most important countries will dissolve overnight, destroying any chance for that much-desired permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

Sicily's Provinces Abolished

Until yesterday, Sicily had seven provinces. They have been abolished. Now, as the result of a law passed by the regional assembly, our island will have less bureaucracy to impede its hoped-for economic prosperity. The former provinces will continue as geographic administrative districts, but unlike actual provinces these will not be obligated to maintain costly "mini-ministries" and overpaid bureaucrats like the useless provincial presidents and their staffs. There will be less redundancy and waste, and more accountability.

It so happens that the infamous provincial presidents were up for election next month. In effect, the positions they were hoping to win no longer exist. No problem, however, for the numerous provincial employees, who will be transferred rather than fired.

Last year, in a prescient move, the regional government abolished provincial licensing of tour guides - who can now work anywhere in Sicily. That's the kind of deregulation we'll see in 2013 as the role of the provinces disappears.

The island's recent attempts to reduce public spending, corruption and sloth are being observed with interest around the country as examples of policies to be implemented nationally.

Sicily this March

Despite a few occasional drops of rain, this is a great month to visit Sicily, just before the main tourism season begins (in April).

This month's magazine presents an article on the delicious delights of St Joseph's Day, on Tuesday March 19th. You'll also find an item on Easter in Sicily. Easter is earlier than usual this year, on the 31st of March.

Bramante's Roma Caput Mundi in New York

Roma Caput Mundi is an exhibit by Sicilian photographer Davide Bramante on Rome as Eternal City and Historic Capital.

Bramante says, "The photos featured in the exhibit combine anywhere from 4 to 9 images, shooting several analog shots on the same frame using common film such as 35 millimeter." Bramante’s vision, motive, and approach coalesce into groundbreaking creativity with this new photographic project.  Each photo consists of a mesmerizing montage, blending images of the ancient and the contemporary city. The result is a poetic and passionate vision of the Italian capital - an archaeological scrapbook of the Eternal City across the millennia, a composite architectural portrait.

Taking photos of Rome and then "enclosing its essence into a mirror of contemporary society" becomes for Bramante a challenge and tribute to the Eternal City and his Motherland. He provides a cutting edge look at the classics, rendered as though a single image, as if it were a pure thought. The result is a fascinating meditation on the ideal concept of the Eternal City. "My photographing represents exactly my way of remembering, thinking, dreaming, hoping, and imagining. Everything overlaps." says Bramante.

"Davide’s photography showcases and celebrates Rome as a historic symbol of cultural, economic, and social value," Miller remarks at his two-level gallery.

Opening Reception: Tuesday, March 5, 2013 from 6 to 9 pm
Exhibition Dates: March 5-31, 2013
Hours: Sunday - Friday, 12 noon to 6:00 pm, and by appointment.

Mark Miller Gallery, 92 Orchard Street between Broome and Delancey, New York (212) 253-9479.  info@markmillergallery.com

Food and Politics

Unless you're at a political fundraiser, the two don't mix very well.

On Friday (February 15th), the Financial Times ran an article by Brian Viner on a cooking class in Palermo, which mentions in passing that the Italian host and hostess twice (and perhaps more than twice) made openly derogatory comments about Americans, referring to the Second World War. By association, the comments also apply to the British, Canadians and Australians - all of whom have troops buried on Italian soil.

Our staff has met writers for the Financial Times - though not Mr Viner - and we wish to make clear that the individuals offering the cookery course mentioned in the article are not associated in any way with Best of Sicily or the fine firms advertised on our site. Some cooking courses are described in my article on learning to cook in Sicily.

For the record (not that it is in any way relevant to Sicilian cuisine!), the war referred to was not initiated by the British or the Americans (several histories are available on our books page), and we find it extremely unfortunate that somebody offering a service to visitors from those countries would insist on insulting her paying guests by dredging up events from 1943 - 70 years ago! Wars are part of history, but anybody offering travel services who wants to focus on that kind of thing should consider a career in some other field.

The hosts and chefs offering the cookery classes listed in my article do not engage in provocative rhetoric, nor do most Italians who work in the travel and tourism industry attempt to insult visitors.

Save money this year!

Yes, you can! You can visit Sicily without going broke.

Check out our Sicily tours page for all kinds of tours at great prices - or at least fair ones.

If you're thinking about independent travel, the Sicily hotels and travel planning page links to all kinds of practical information and services. If you want somebody to organise it for you, Sicily Concierge is a travel agent specialised in Sicily

This is reliable information from real travel experts, not from somebody who puts up a website about Sicily to exploit the travel market.

Crocetta's Crusade Continues

Even on a slow day, Sicilian politics are at least entertaining.

Like rats fleeing a sinking ship, opposition polticians are leaving their parties for the "Megaphone" movement founded recently by newly-elected Sicilian governor Rosario Crocetta. Seems they finally got the message that change is in the air. It's a little like the Fascists who quickly burned their party membership cards when the Allies arrived in 1943.

In just two months, Crocetta has addressed issues important to visitors by ordering mass reassignments of managers and bureaucrats in the tourism-related agencies, especially Beni Culturali, and taking control of certain services that had been farmed out to the corrupt friends of equally corrupt politicians.

The wholesale theft of the last decade is astounding. In the agency responsible for vocational training programmes some 20 million euros are missing.

In the works are plans to keep historical and archaeological sites open longer beginning this Spring, so you can visit Segesta and Agrigento  after dark.

Your editors applaud the efforts of Rosario Crocetta and his team. We believe that these changes will be good for visitors and for the tourism industry in general.

Sicily Now!

This month's issue of the Best of Sicily Magazine presents articles on Wagner, Sicilian hazelnuts and visiting Sicily now, during the cooler months.

We repeat it often because Winter really is one of the best times to come to Sicily. Apart from the cooler weather - Summer in Sicily is very hot - there are fewer crowds at the sights and sites you visit. We were in Segesta two days ago and we had the vast archeological site to ourselves.

Tourism Ministry Shake-up

The typical public-sector employee in Sicily's ministries, including Beni Culturali (Cultural Assets), which includes tourism, historic sites and museums, has held his/her position for at least twenty years, having been hired with the help of a political party and a friend or two. He/she is not particularly competent or productive, speaks no English and is "protected" by a trade union - and therefore can not be fired.

But such a do-nothing or charlatan - like the charming clown shown here - can be transferred to another division of the same assessorato (agency). That is exactly what Sicilian governor Rosario Crocetta is doing, 60 or 70 managers at a time. It's the biggest shake-up in sixty years, and most Sicilians support it 100 percent. That includes your editors.

Administration of these regional agencies is mediocre and has been for decades. Altering the organization can only help matters. Things are so bad that it cannot possibly hurt. It is long overdue, and it will benefit the function of tourism-related services in Sicily.

Though lacking a solid legal basis for their position, employees and unions are threatening strikes and street protests. No problem; we Italians are used to that - and after a few days of protesting the employees will return to their newly-assigned offices and (for a change) do a little work.