Siracusa Stories

You may or may not notice that today's vehicle was sans windows which meant we had natural air conditioning.  Luckily we left early in the morning, about 7:45, so things hadn't heated up for our 50 minute drive to Noto.  It never got super hot in there but it was certainly a different way to be traveling for such a distance on a hot day.  At least we didn't have to worry about dirty windows if we wanted to take photos while driving along.

Sicily grows a lot of lemons.  Some of the trees were covered like these (maybe we should do this for our cherry trees!), others were just out in the open.

There are also orchards and orchards of olive trees, they've been growing olives here for centuries.  

The bus dropped us off and we walked down the Villa, or Park, that led to the entrance of the old city of Noto.

We were then greeted by this impressive gate.  While not part of the original city, this gate was built in a theatric, dramatic, Baroque style (Baroque means it's over the top with decorations) to honor the king of Sicily in the 19th century.  It was made to impress and it certainly did.

Each of the symbols atop the gate had some significance, the tower represented Noto and power, the pelican stood for a willingness to sacrifice for the next generation, the dog for loyalty.

The main street is paved with lava stone, the hardest stone to be found in the area.  The stairs were just kind of fun, the photo would have been better without the guy's leg in it.

The courtyard on the left is the old Medieval style, simple and one that leads into a maze of alleyways to confound any enemies trying to fight their way in.  There was also a fresh water well in the center of the courtyard but it's now covered.

The color of the stone here is local to Noto.  The sulphur in the limestone gives it a golden color when the sun shines on it, unlike that quarried in other parts of Sicily.

In 1693 Sicily suffered a devastating earthquake.  Most of the buildings standing today are rebuilds from the devastating quake when the earth dropped out from under the town and hundreds of people died.  Miraculously this statue of Mary survived.

With the heaving of the earth buildings were pushed up that had once been at ground level.  The second story here was once the ground floor.  They know this because the house numbers are up above like on the photo on the right.

Another example of what was once a ground level doorway.

The Cathedral of San Nicolo of Mira is the largest in Noto.

The structure was built following the 1693 quake, including it's monumental staircase.

The stairs are symbolic of making a sacrifice to God by climbing them, and in the past worshippers would sometimes climb these stairs on their knees.

In 1996 the interior of the cathedral was undergoing a restoration and the marble facades like those shown here were removed from all of the columns inside.  Unfortunately someone didn't realize that the columns beneath the marble had been made with rubble and when the marble was removed the interior of the church collapsed.  There is one small chapel that remained intact so that you can see what the entire interior would have once looked like.

When the interior was restored after the collapse it was decided to leave it white inside to remind them of what was lost, including some lovely frescoes.

I found this baptistry within the church interesting.  The brown marble is a font used for baptizing by immersion that was in the original church built before 1693.  In the late 17th century the church switched to using a fountain instead.

The altar is relatively simple

compared to this chapel of the patron saint of Noto, who must have been looking over it when it miraculously survived the 1996 collapse.

I think this was a nice reminder that some spaces in churches we visit are actually reserved for worship.

It was a lovely place to visit.

Not far from the cathedral is the Via Nicolaci, where the Nicolaci family resided in their palace.  These guys were newcomers to the wealthy set, tuna merchants of all things, and the nobility of the area were put out that they were able to obtain this land, so forbid them to build at the top of the hill, they had to build on the slant.

These days, each year there is a festival in May where the street is closed off and flower designs are made on the street, based on the theme of the year.  The photo on the left is what it looked like in 2022.  You can still see the outlines of this year's designs on the street surface on the right.

The palace is down the street on the left.  You can see the multiple balconies on the upper floor.

There are the incredible individual hand carvings under each of the balconies, each of them sending a message to the blue bloods who didn't want the Nicolacis there.  Some are images of the trade winds symbolizing their making money through trade, chimeras under another balcony symbolized the Nicolaci's ability to change, another is horses symbolizing power, one is children showing that they would continue to live there.  They were each beautifully detailed and definitely sent a message.

In the center of the palace was an open courtyard with a well in the center, a symbol of wealth.  They had some sweet smelling Sicilian Jasmine growing here.

The courtyard entrance was long, another way to project wealth and power.

Another thing the Nicolacis did to show they were there to stay was to build the church at the end of the street at the top of the hill.  The message was one of God is with us.  You get an idea of the slant of the road in the photo on the right.

A couple of random things on the way back to Siracusa from Noto.  One was an abandoned house out in the middle of nowhere, I had to wonder what happened to someone's dream house and where they went.  And then there was the mini Eiffel Tower just sitting behind a fence, that one was kinda weird.

Once we got back to Siracusa we were off to the Archaeological Park or Neopolis.

Brilliant bougainvillea and pale pink oleander were beautiful.

Part of this site used to be a stone quarry.  You can see how far the slaves dug down.

This plinth stands kind of in the middle of this part of the site, note how on the top of the photo on the right there are the ruins of a building.  That way you can tell where ground level used to be and how deep the stone was quarried.  The deeper they went the stronger the stone.

Both the Greeks and the Romans used slaves here to quarry stone.  The "cave" above is a space that had been carved out.

You can get an idea of how deep this S-shaped cave is from these photos.

When you look closer at the stone you can still see the chisel marks in the stone.  Slaves were sent down into the quarries to cut out blocks.  It was a death sentence for them where most of them never came out but spent the rest of their miserable lives doing back breaking work in dim light with little food and no comforts.

Also on the site is this shell shaped Greek theater, ones of the biggest theaters of the western Mediterranean.  The lowers seats were carved from stone, while the upper seats were made of blocks created from the carved stone seat rubble.  The shape of the theater made for great acoustics.  No each year during the summer, the stone seats are covered to help preserve them while concerts are presented here in the theater.  This year's will run for another week, then the metal coverings will be removed and the theater will be all stone again.  Next summer the process will begin all over again.

It takes about a week to install and then removed the metal seats.  Pretty amazing to still be using something created in the 5th century B.C.

We were ready for some shade at this point, but it was on to

the Roman amphitheater.  It is a bit newer, it was made in the first century B.C.  With this photo it is easy to see the difference between the two theaters, since with an amphitheater the audience sits on two sides, it has an elliptical shape rather than a shell shape. 

The amphitheater built on the UNESCO World Heritage Site was the last Roman amphitheater built in Siracusa.  If you look closely the seats on the side shown here were made of masonry,

while on this side they were carved into the white limestone of Siracusa.

My friend Deborah called these the "steps of doom", as we wondered how many walked down them who then met their death with the gladiators.

These were just of strange pieces of art in the city.  I told the Hansen kids that the one on the right looked like something out of the Netflix show Centaurworld.

Oleander grows everywhere in Sicily, much of it pruned to look like flowering trees.

Now while I took this photo in Noto, by this time of the tour we were all dreaming of sitting down to enjoy some good Sicilian food, lunch rather than breakfast though.

Apparently I was too hungry to take a photo of my delicious pasta but I did remember to take one of this scrumptious pistachio cannoli.  It was the best cannoli I had ever tasted,, crispy, soft and crunchy. loaded with pistachios on the outside.  What a treat!

The restaurant was on a square that was the administrative center of Siracusa during WW2 and on a plaza that was designed by Mussolini himself.

This building is an example of the typical Fascist architectural style of Mussolini.

A view of the entire plaza.

Our final tour stop was a building that dated back to the Greeks, with columns like this one incorporated into what became a Christian cathedral.  This spot would have been the entrance to this Temple to Athena, but in a cathedral the altar has to go on the east, not the front door like on a Greek temple.  Our guide, Carmela, was great at explaining what to look at on all the buildings we saw today.  So this entrance to the temple/church was closed off and moved to another side of the building.

This cathedral is a real mix of architectural style, the massive front facade is

totally Baroque and incredibly impressive.

Even the entrance has some marvelous detail in the white stone, but when you actually enter

it is an absolute WOW!  All of the Doric columns in the church are original from the Greek temple,

as are the arched walls that line the center aisle.

The altar and floor are Baroque,

and the ceiling is Renaissance wood.

The really cool thing about this church is that when you stand at the front near the altar and then look back, your entire perspective of the interior changes.  You are suddenly looking into a well-preserved Greek temple.  It was amazing!

I had Karl pose next to one of the massive columns just to give you some perspective on their size.  This is one of the most unique churches I have ever been in, and I've seen quite a few of them by now.

As we walked back to the dock to catch our tender to Serenade we wandered through some of the narrow streets of old Siracusa, most of them where merchants used to work, now they just sell.  The fish mobiles were fun to see hanging above our heads, and when I saw all these crocheted toys I couldn't help but think of Kara who makes many of these designs herself.

Once back on the ship it was the usual, cool down, shower, work on blog and video then off to get some dinner.  As we ate out on the back deck we could see Mount Etna off our port side, a great farewell to a terrific day on Sicily!