Forza Italia! (part III)

Last one, I promise. I'm dragging this out.

Back to the main island now in to the port town of Trapani. The seas were much calmer this time so I managed to disembark a little less pale this time. I had booked us into Trapani for only one night. It really was meant to be a stop gap until we could drive to the beach town of San Vito lo Capo. It was also the only night we used Airbnb. It hasn't really caught on in Sicily (not much has) but this was an incredible experience. Nothing to do with the accommodation or the location. It was Nicola, the local who checked us in. He made a point to seat us down and in 15 minutes tell us everything we needed to know about Trapani. His insight was invaluable! The local hotspots that we otherwise would never have known about were all opened up to us. This had the potential to be the 'touristy' part of our holiday but young Nicola spared us. His most seismic contribution: 

Calvino's Pizza!

Seriously guys, this was earthshateringly good pizza. Without any question of a doubt the greatest pizza I have ever tasted in my life. Nicola warned us before we went to get there right when it opened at 7pm otherwise we would not get in. People drove from Palermo (over an hour away) to eat here. Only locals of course. He also warned us that these guys were rude, grumpy and ignorant but promised us that we'd forgive them. When people first think of Sicily they think of the Mafia. Sicilians hate this association and from being there it doesn't really seem that influence is evident. But this place I'm sure was being run by Mafiosi. The servers, the cooks, the cashiers were all grumpy looking middle-aged men with white shirts, black slacks, black thick-rimmed glasses, the bushiest eyebrows you ever did see, sons of Vito Corleone himself! Zero English of course and I almost buckled under his scrutinizing stare as I attempted to order in terrible, warbled Italian.  Decor? Non-existent. The tables were each in individual rooms off a corridor far from the safety of the streets. All of this accentuated the culinary experience:

I forgive you grumpy pizza men

And just like that it was over

As if one worlds-best wasn't enough, Nicola's other suggestion
was this back-alley granita (kind of a fresh slushee/sorbet) joint.
We got not one, not two, but three of these. Erin is holding a
Granita Fragola (strawberry).

I adopted this pose a lot on this trip

To top the night off we stumbled across an outdoor theatrical production. We
had no idea what they were saying of course but they could have been saying
anything and in Italian it would have sounded magical.

The next morning we took a day trip to an idyllic town called Erice set on top of a hill with narrow cobble stone streets and cute little shops. It was quite touristy but offered us some nice views over Trapani and even out as far as Trapani. We stopped in a well-known patisserie for some breakfast.

The view towards where we were headed later from Erice

The view from the other side. Down to Trapani. Off in the distance is the
archipelago of Egadi, three islands, the furthest you can see on the right
is Marettimo, our home for 3 days. 

The patisserie

Breakfast

On to San Vito lo Capo, one of the few beach towns on the island, and the last stop of our Sicilian adventure.

Fruit was for sale everywhere on the sides of the roads. Nectarines, peaches, grapes
became staples of our road trips

Snorkel-dork

The beach we stumbled across close to our B&B had an impromptu public
BBQ on the go with some pretty fresh fish being offered up

You know us Maddens don't say no to a feed. We made light work of this

Breakfast again. A place where this is an acceptable routine for breakfast
needs to be lauded. This practice should be proliferated in our home lands. 

Erin chose the healthy option (as well as the unhealthy one)

On our last day we headed to a nature reserve on the coast that contained some pretty neat and private beaches. It was a nice way to finish off the trip.

Another best ever. Ask Erin how she found the bruschetta

Deep-fried ball of risotto

Pistachio chocolate ice lollys. Right up Erin's street. 

Any chance I got I was reading that book!

At the airport, homeward bound

Probably a bit excessive of me to dedicate 3 blog posts to an 8 day long holiday but in my defense it was my favourite holiday of all time (excluding SB trips of course). Things will get a lot more boring for us from here on out but we'll keep you posted in case anything noteworthy happens (birth of our child, moving to CA, house purchases, more food, etc.).


Until next time blogonauts!

Niall