Taranto   We left Bari Monday morning and drove south past Taranto, which is on the Gulf of Taranto (Map by Norman Einstein), which separates the Italian heel from the toe. If the name isn't familiar, think about dancing. Yes, the tarantella comes from this area. We proceeded down the Italian toe, which is Calabria, and reached the Calabrian side of the Strait of Messina (Photo by Rhegion), with Sicily on the other side.

Monsters   I remember reading about two female monsters, Scylla, who devoured passing sailors, and Charybdis, who repeatedly would swallow huge amounts of seawater, and later in the day, spew it forth again. Charybdis was the interesting explanation the ancients had for the tides. Much later I found out that both monsters were supposedly located on the Strait of Messina, Scylla on the mainland side, and Charybdis in Sicily. And most recently of all, I found that the Italian name is Scilla, but pronounced SHILL-lla, and the other is Caridde (ca-REEDD-dday). But knowing this, it is still an absolutely enchanting thing to see an exit on the autostrada matter-of-factly leading to the town named Scilla.

Eucalyptus   Between Scilla and the exit we needed for the ferry there was an "area di servizio" where we stopped. We didn't need gas, but I needed the view. The autostrada here is very high in the mountains and you look down on the strait. The area between Sicily and the mainland is quite wide further south, and gradually narrows up to the very tip of Sicily curving slightly and pointing at the mainland. This is what we looked down over.

When we've traveled in southern Europe, particularly Spain and Portugal, it's often that we come across Eucalyptus trees, and here as well, right in the rest stop, the view was framed by them. We always like to take one of the long, narrow leaves and crush it to get the smell of cough drops.

You would expect that the bridge to be built would run east-west, as the ferry crosses, but the drawing I saw showed that it would go almost north-south, well really, I suppose NNW-SSE, between that little tip of Sicily and the mainland. Or, think of 11 and 5 on a clock face. When we got off the ferry in Sicily, I said "82", as our total number of destinations continued to increase.

Malta   Our very first day we took the ferry from Catania, in Sicily, to Malta. It had been difficult to plan, because of the irregular schedule, and I had had to call Catania from New York before we left to finalize it. We did a day trip, without the car, which allowed for only a short visit. The people on the boat were very helpful in planning our getting off quickly, getting a taxi for a drive around, and getting back on in time to go back. Driving on the left, we saw a few areas, but the capital, Valletta, was the most interesting, including the medieval old town with some steep San Francisco-style hills, and the palace of the Knights of Malta. Of course, I thought of the "Maltese Falcon", with Bogart, Greenstreet, and Lorre.

As we got off the ferry in Malta, I said "83", which is as high as we'll get for new destinations for this summer. We added Guernsey, Jersey, Sicily, and Malta this trip. Curiously, all were islands.

Palermo   We're staying in Catania, in the center of the east coast of Sicily (click to enlarge)(Map by Zamonin), just south of Messina and its Strait, since it's centrally located for where we want to go, which included Siracusa (Syracuse), and then we drove across Sicily to Palermo, and it was a very pleasant city, very medieval, and quite charming. Also note how prominent Mount Etna (below) is.

Family Names   The majority of immigrants from Italy to the US were from the south, which traditionally had the poverty people were trying to escape, and this is evident in the pronunciations of Italian words often used in the US. Ricotta, the cheese, is pronounced just as spelled by most Italians, but in the south it's pronounced rigott', and that's what you tend to hear in Italian neighborhoods in the US. You tend to see the shorter, darker people here in the south that many Americans associate with all Italians.

I’ve never seen any signs of street fairs anywhere in Italy, such as the San Gennaro festival held in Little Italy, and plenty of others in US Italian neighborhoods. But in the last two weeks, both in Puglia and Sicily, we've gone through three towns with the wooden arches up along the main street, preparing for a festa.

But it's the names that surprise me. Beverly has relatives named Palermo, and then there’s (Di) Napoli. But as I drive around these areas I see towns that I never heard of, but which sound familiar. The reason is that so many people I've met in the US have these town names as surnames. We're in Catania. In Tampa there are lots of billboards advertising the legal firm of Catania & Catania. We passed by Squillace. I used to work with someone with that name. In Palermo there was a street named Butera. My father used to know a mechanic named Butera. One town after another sounds familiar.

Etna   Catania lies just south of Mount Etna (Photo by Jeanne Boleyn). We've gotten some impressive views of it. You can ascend it from the north or south. In the steeper north, you have to take a four-wheel drive bus right from the start to go to the crater. (Years ago we looked into the crater of Vesuvius. One crater is enough.) But in the south, according to Michelin, which is our travel bible, you can drive up a very nice road much of the way, up to the point where you'd need the buses. We drove up yesterday.

Etna is about 3300 meters/11,000 feet high. We drove to the refuge called Rifugio Sapienza at about 1900 meters/6400 feet, which means we went about 60% of the way up. There were lava flows all the way, but they looked like piles of brown-black dirt. I didn't see any of the type we saw in Hawaii, which looked like frozen, black flows of water, with little waves. As the road went around a switchback I was surprised to see we were going around some lava with the tile roof of a house sticking out. Apparently the volcanic soil around Etna is wonderful for growing just about anything. One dinner was garnished with Etna porcini mushrooms, and we've had wines grown from around Etna. We ended our Etna visit by taking the Circumetnea, a series of roads by which you drive around Etna and get views from all directions.

Mosca   In yesterday's Corriere there was another article about the high-speed rail proposals, but this time there was some vague talk about it eventually reaching "Mosca". It is incredible to think of high-speed rail possibly linking Paris with Moscow.

Tempo d'estate   One last thing from Corriere. In today's paper they were saying that at the Venice Film Festival in September they want to do a special hommage to Katherine Hepburn.

Last summer, while still in New York before we went to Venice, I had to rent "Summertime" (1956), to once again see Hepburn meeting Rossano Brazzi in Venice. It was a great re-introduction to the city. Now, to conclude the hommage to Hepburn, the festival wants to show the restored "Tempo d'estate" ("Summertime"). I think that's great, not only to honor her as an artist, but to make the connection of Hepburn to Italy, and even more specifically Hepburn to Venice. That's just perfect.

Tomorrow is the last long-haul drive. We go to Napoli.