Happy Fat Tuesday!

Happy Fat Tuesday! The boys had school today so we were off to adventure with just Jimmy & Gin.

Today we celebrated Fat Tuesday with a trip to the nearby bakery for some Italian breakfast pastries. I had a delicious one with Nutella inside, Brian enjoyed his filled with ham and cheese and Jimmy and Virginia split two pastries filled with sweet ricotta - one baked and one fried. It was a tasty start to our morning.

We also saw these boob pastries. The story of Saint Agatha, the patron saint of Catania, says that she was a 15 year old girl who made a vow of virginity and refused to wed. In response she was tortured and they cut off one of her breasts. So all around you'll see breast pastries with cherry nipples and it makes us laugh each time. 

Our plan today was to go to Acireal to see some of their Carnavale displays. Our fist Carnavale visit on Sunday was to the city that has amazing costumes. Acireal is known for their amazing parade floats. We arrived in time for the floats to be available for viewing. It said 9:30 in the program but 9:30 came and went and not a float to be had. Instead, we visited a few nearby churches. One we just poked our heads into, but the other allowed us to look inside and to climb up to both the balcony and the bell tower. This church was beautiful. Ornate paintings on the ceiling were my favorite part, but the bell tower was pretty neat too.

After we were done in the churches we still didn’t see floats so decided to walk to the other side of the festival area, maybe 8 blocks away. No floats there either so we stopped at a park overlooking the water. It’s pretty high up so it was a gorgeous view.

Next we walked back down to our original spot and grabbed a few munchies to keep up our strength. One was an Arancini, which Virginia describes as the Sicilian version of fast food. It was a teardrop shaped ball of rice, stuffed with cheese and ragu, then fried. Sooooo delicious!

Still no floats to be had so we hung around for a bit and perused some shops. Around 11:15 (1 hour and 45 minutes after the time the program said... things always happen on Italy time) we eventually saw a float coming our way. It was huge and just barely fit down the street! We got to take pictures and then saw a second float. Eventually we saw more on the far side of the festival area and we decided to walk to them instead of waiting for them. Well, we ended up making a loop back to our original spot as we noticed tons of floats decorated in flowers. By the time we were done with the city we had walked 4.5 miles already.

The interesting thing about the float themes is that they all had to do with things in current culture. One was about not using plastics. Another talked about why video games were bad. One float showed how technology and social media detracted from the world and another that was positive about the use of technology and social media. It was just interesting how they didn’t shy away from what might be considered controversial here in the states. And the floats were so well done!

After leaving the floats we headed off to the Taormina. This is a pretty touristy area is filled with shops but it has some idyllic little streets and views of the Mediterranean. We grabbed a late lunch and some delicious orange and lemon granita, as well as a few cannoli to share later.

Taormina has a really great old amphitheater that we toured. The cool thing about it is that it is still in use to this day. Jim & Gin have actually been here to watch concerts before.

By the time we were finished seeing the theater our day was nearly over. We headed back to the house and played games with the boys, did a little FaceTime with Carissa, then headed up to pack.

Sadly, today was our last day in Sicily, as we are off to new adventures tomorrow. We really loved our time here and know we couldn’t have done it without Jim & Gin. We will miss them and the boys so much, especially since they still have quite some time left here in Sicily.

Now the question is, where to next???