Hotel Alberi Del Paradiso

The sea and the fish within .......

by lichinga

It is commonly believed Italians think about animals as far as they are good to eat: I cannot deny there's some truth in this... So, Sicily is a Paradise for tuna-fish lovers: forget about the canned stuff, it has no comparison at all with what you may experience in Sicily, where tuna-fish capture is an old tradition (now it disapperaed, because they didn't know about over-fishing....) carried on in the "tonnara" and culminating with a peculiar action called "mattanza". Nowadays, tuna-fish is no more as abundant as it used to be, but mr. Antonino Serio prepares wonderful tuna-fish with olive oil, it is sold in glass containers (look for his fish shop along Cefalu main street, on the right, i f you go towards Palermo). Finally, nobody is allowed to forget about "bottarga": dried tuna-fish eggs which are used to scrape over spaghetti, the same way Parnigiano cheese is used.

Cathedral Portal

by hquittner

The portal (entry) is in the S. wall up a few steps from the parvis. It is set in a wide 4-sided linear frame (like around a Moorish door) but it is slightly peaked (gable-like). At the center is a 4-banded basket-handle archivolt. The stones are crudely carved and rest upon imposts and piers that look like columns (but may be single pieces). The carvings on the arch blocks are design-floral in nature and single. There is a hint of figuration but it is meaningless to me.I do not think it is Zodiacal. There is no tympanum. This is pretty early stuff. The first good portals in France and Spain are 12C.

Cefalú

by monkeyfeesh

After a few days in Palermo, a visit to Cefalú provides a welcome rest. In Cefalú you can actually cross roads without having to watch every possible direction for cars and feeling like your life is about to end. You can relax in Cefalú, wandering its narrow, winding streets. It's easy to cover the whole place on foot. There's a pleasant seaside village atmosphere, and it's pretty well geared towards tourism. You could imagine it being overwhelmed by tourists in the summer months, but at the time we visited it was perfect - enough not to feel out of place but not enough to feel like you're in Blackpool on a wet bank holiday.

A definite highlight here is La Rocca. Cefalú nestles at the foot of this spur of rock; half an hour to an hour of walking gets you to the top, where you're rewarded with spectacular views from the ruins of medieval fortifications.