Tues 21 May - Agrigento
We thoroughly appreciated our later departure from our luxury resort. I suspect that will be the pick of it for our whole tour. Good while it lasted.
The drive through to Sciacca (Shukker) treated us to countryside producing grapes, oranges and olives the like of which I have never experienced. I quite like olives in NZ but they pale into insignificance compared with real Sicilian olives, as do tomatoes. Italian wine differs from the French in that it has no added sugar. The  sweetness comes from the sun. The Sciacca population is 51,000 and is famed for its springs to which people come for therapeutic treatment. There is a very high immigration population here. Today is the first that has indicated the famed Mediterranean warmth. Not hot at all but no puffer jacket required. We had a delightful couple of hours wandering the picturesque town and sampling cappuccino  and ricotta delicacies. Live, laugh and forget the kilos. We found a museum (well, Peter did) and admired a well preserved Sicillian homestead of a wealthy family.
On we drove to the UNESCO site of Agrigento famed for its Valley of the temples. 27 years ago I was lucky enough to visit the Acropolis with my friends Glen and Laurie. Agrigento has the Temple of Concordia which dates from the 5th century BC and is in better repair. I am sure that this would look more spectacular with the flood lights which are set up. We had dazzling sunlight instead. Our guide Claudio was a splendid Sicilian man born in these parts who gave us such a detailed historical background punctuated by his dry sense of humour. Any time he stopped talking he burst into song. He was a comprehensive entertainment on his own quite apart from the awe-inspiring surroundings. It is miraculous that these gigantic yet graceful structures have survived 24 centuries of tormented history. Some of our travel group of 39 people (mainly Americans) have done Italy and Sicily before but have returned purely for today's spectacle. Once again Josephine for telling us we just HAD to come on this particular Globus tour. You're right. I'll pass your advice on to other friends.
Then we came to the Agrigento goats. What splendid beasts they are with their long shaggy coats and their unique huge horns shaped like corkscrews.
Our accommodation tonight is a poor relation to last night's, but hey, you can't have it all. Perhaps the food will be good.