I set up this blog to record my travel exploits from previous vacations, but because life and work seem to get in the way, I never published my first post in this blog.

So now that I have returned from my first overseas vacation since before my son was born (3+ years ago!), I'm dusting it off to share some insights into my visit to the Italian island of Sicily.

Unfortunately the vacation didn't quite get off to the best start, partly due to the French air traffic control strikes, and mainly due to Ryanair (readers familiar with Ryanair are probably shaking their heads as they read this bit and I can almost hear the 'only yourselves to blame' thoughts.  I had those thoughts too, but they always seem to rope us back in with their really cheap flights...). 

The short story is we were kept on the runway at Manchester airport for 5 hours before actually taking off into the night.  Unfortunately this 'delay' meant that our transfer at Trapani was missed and we needed to get a taxi costing €200. Did I mention we were travelling with 2 kids?  Well one was a 6 month baby and she was a legend, sleeping throughout all the dramas, but my boy who was nearly 3 and has bags more energy than Ryanair fill their fuel tanks with, well he was a bit more of a handful to keep occupied.  

To cut this ramble short, I've got serious doubts about using Ryanair ever again (but like a hot ex girlfriend, there will always be some temptation, no matter how psycho)...

Anyway, we rocked up to our AirBnB at 5am and hit the bed hard.

Hopes for a long lie-in to recover were dashed at about 10am to the sounds of a marching band outside the window:

It seems that we had arrived in Palermo just in time for the 'Solemn procession with the venerated wooden simulacrum of Mary SS of the Seven Sorrows through the streets of the city'.

For a 'solemn' procession, the marching band actually played some quite uplifting music.  And the church itself had been adorned in colourful lights.  It was quite a pleasant way to start the day, and the whole trip.

For our first planned excursion, we headed out to the very impressive Cattedrale di Palermo.  A building that has been appended over the years with different architectural styles, restorations and alterations. Depending on who was in charge at the time.  

One of the most impressive internal features was the meridiana, a bronze line set into the floor of the church running North to South. A small hole in one of the domes casts an image of the sun onto the line passing through different signs of the zodiac at various points of the year.  I must have been so in awe that I forgot to take a decent picture of it...  Either that or I'd had enough of churches for today and was ready to eat.