My passport. And more damn sardines.

Ciao!

Well, after an hour long Three Stooges-like escapade trying to find
each other between exits on the autostrada, I was finally able to
connect with the other tourists and retrieve my passport. Whew!! I
was so fortunate that they had been staying at my previous hotel and
just happened to be traveling this way today. However, it sure would
help if gas stations had actual, you know, addresses and stuff so that
people could find each other. "I'm at the Esso station". "Which Esso
station?". "The one near Avola". "But WHICH one near Avola?!". Etc. :)

So once back in Siracusa, it was almost 2:30pm and I was starving,
having only had a little fruit and a piece of cheese at 7am. So, I
ended up back at the waterfront where I ate yesterday. Thought fritto
misto (fresh, lightly fried seafood) and some salad sounded good. I
figured the seafood would be clams, mussels, calamari, and shrimp,
since that's what was on the menu in the other dishes (you see where
this is going, don't you?).

So out the platter came, consisting of: calamari rings - check; baby
octopus - um, check; small whole fried shrimp with head on and such -
too much work in my opinion, but check; aaaaaand, that's right - a
nice big pile of whole, fried sardines. I ate several bites of almost
everything. And interestingly enough, there was a big dent in that
pile of sardines when I finished. And a very happy kitty under my
table :). Ha!

I'd like to think that traveling to a foreign country hasn't made me
more dumb, but there was a moment yesterday afternoon that I really
had to question it. I was walking along the waterfront, peering down
below at the water swirling over the rocks, and I saw these tan-
colored oval oblong objects swimming in the water. They were motoring
right along, swirling around. And I'm thinking to myself - is that
some sort of sea cucumber? But I thought sea cucumbers were a dark
greenish-black, and hungout below the water, not on top? But maybe
these are special Sicilian sea cucumbers? I almost even stopped a
passerby to ask them "Che cos'a?" (What is that?). Seriously. I was
fascinated. Until on closer inspection, I noticed that it was schools
of fish below the objects that were propelling them along. And that
the objects were small baguettes. You're embarrassed for me, aren't
you? Yeah, I don't blame you.

Well, it's time for a little nap :). Tomorrow morning I drive to
Catania, drop off the car, catch a flight to Napoli, then take the
train to Sorrento. The rain dodged us for the most part here, but it
shows thunderstorms where I'm headed. Fingers crossed for a smooth
flight, and sunshine instead!

Love,
Lisa

Sent from my iPhone