Noto Last Days

Wednesday 9/28 - Yesterday was the last day our friends had in Sicily, so we all went to the beach (Lido d'Avola this time) for a little while. The rest of the day was full of chores - laundry (by hand, again!), groceries - and relaxing! And cannoli ;-)

Thursday 9/29 - more relaxing and small chores. We found out the bus schedule for Sunday (we finally decided against going to Catania a day early); we'll aim for th 9:15 AST bus. We hunted up some internet, but not enough to get books, send mail, or upload pictures :-\  Pizza for lunch (da portare via = take out), beef stew for dinner. Oddly enough, "lasagna" here is listed in quotes on menus, if at all - the one place Rick was looking forward to for a lasagna lunch did this - and said it was with bechamel sauce! He had fantastic lasagna in Florence; we're guessing it isn't a normal Sicilian specialty...
These are the days of long discussions - likes and dislikes about our current trip, where and when next time. It's difficult to make any firm plans, or even submit concrete ideas, because we have no internet! Oh, how dependant we have become! I still have to try arancini (those ubiquitous balls of rice, stuffed with stuff)...

Friday 9/30 - we had an interesting surprise today - the Prince of Monaco made an official visit to Noto! All the schools had outings to be part of the welcome - some had special hats, some special shirts, all had paper flags to wave. I waited on a park bench next to a nice Italian woman. Giana is 80, from Genova, and one of her sons was the guy in charge of security for the visit (you can see him in some of the photos; blue shirt, bald, sunglasses). Once the children were shuffled into place, I moved on to the cathedral steps and waited there. When the Prince arrived, he didn't go up the red carpet to the town hall; instead, he and the Mayor (I think - he was an official with an Italian flag sash) walked along the street, greeting the children, shaking their hands.

I brought my "classico" arancini (stuffed with meat) back to the apartment for lunch :-)

Saturday 10/1 - So, it's our last day in Noto, and I finally got a tourist map of the town; I can't believe how many interesting buildings are here! We went into the Chiesa di Santa Chiara.