Day 368: Exploring Syracuse

Full day of exploration today! We headed out fairly early and made our way down to the waterfront area of the city. Syracuse is almost on the south-eastern tip of Sicily, and the oldest part is actually an island known as Ortygia, just slightly off the mainland. It was founded by Greek colonists around 500 BC and was one of their most important cities. Home to Plato and Archimedes, we couldn't wait to get started.

We walked over to Ortygia and had a look around - lots of narrow streets, old churches and the like. A couple of Greek ruins here and there, including a nice temple, but mostly just Italian stuff. There was a devastating earthquake that hit Sicily in 1693, which resulted in a lot of the buildings being rebuilt in contemporary baroque style, so we enjoyed looking at that too.

Checked out the fortress on the waterfront, but that was a bit of a let down as large areas were closed off for restoration. Acted on a good tip from a friend for lunch to visit a particular panini shop in a market, but realised the queue was going to be several hours so bailed and headed to the place next door.

By the time we'd been seated, ordered, eaten our paninis, paid the bill and got ready to depart, we would've been maybe halfway through the original queue. It was a good idea, but oh well.

Departing Ortygia, we headed back up through the city to the archaeological park. Both the Greeks and Romans left a strong legacy here of buildings, and these are now slowly coming to light. There's a large amphitheatre from Roman times, very reminiscent of the Colosseum in Rome (though I suppose they all are in a way!), a couple of temples, and a huge Greek theatre as well which was quite magnificent. The Greeks had a way of building theatres in spectacular locations because the crowd's panoramic view was as much of the performance as the actors, so this had great views down across town and to the sea as well.

Pretty great condition too, and only a couple of groups so if you dodged them it was mostly to ourselves. Fairly exhausted and by now late in the day, we headed back home. Stayed in again, with more home-cooked pasta.Read more