Messina and Taormina, Sicily

In an effort to catch up- having discovered the wi-fi on Royal Caribbean to be spotty at best- I will dispense with most of the commentary, and allow the pictures to speak for themselves.

Docked in Messina, Emily and I secured a cab for roundtrip to the nearby village of Taormina, using her manual chair and bringing our ramp along; Allesandro, our driver, did not speak much English but we enjoyed our attempts to share the day together. He left us at the top of the hill, as there are no cars allowed within old Taormina.

From our balcony on the ship...

Toarmina's centre...


This mosaic of the infant Christ and Mary is along the path through the tower pictured above...

Every sidestreet looks like this...

frutta di marzapane...

Candied fruits- delicious!


From the cliff bordering the old Toarmina centre...


Arancini di Riso, con prosciutto, formaggio e piselli: a differenza di qualsiasi cosa può trovare a casa...

The Cathedral of Messina: built by the Normans in the 12th century, contains the remains of Conrad, ruler of both Germany and Sicily in the 13th century (quite a commute, in those days...), and had to be rebuilt after a 1908 earthquake, and bombings by the Allies in World War Two. The bell tower, one of the largest astronomical clocks in the world, rings at noon with large, golden statues mechanically  illustrating events from the civil and religious history of the city...

For disabled travellers: smooth, even cobblestones abound, as do threshold steps of about 4" max. The main part of old town is fairly level and wide, but to get back to the cab area it is very steep and busy with traffic. That being said, it turned out to be one of the easier excursions on the cruise...