The Best Laid Plans

For my belated 70^th birthday present to Mike:

• Rent a car for 24 hours
• Drive in a leisurely fashion across Sicily to Palermo, allowing 6 hours for 275 km to get to
• Teatro Massimo in Palermo,
  
  world  famous for the building and its acoustics [and for the fact that The Godfather was shot on the steps] for the 1830 performance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni , before which we would identify a good restaurant, admire the building and the well dressed opera goers, have a glass of wine & some antipasti and stroll into our seats
  
  
  

  

  The ceiling.....

• Enjoy a wonderful dinner, sleep well and drive gently back the next morning.

We loaded our tidy clothes into the car exactly on time and set off.  An hour later, outside Gela, I said “what’s that noise?”  - “Just what I was wondering” – with that, the car ground to a halt, on a hill.  We called the hire agent who unhelpfully shouted “Push! Push!” at me – we had already understood it was a Toyota and would not start unless the clutch was depressed.  I called back a second time to no avail, so rang the excellent  Antonio of RAVI in Marina di Ragusa [who, we learned later, was painting his kitchen & performed the whole exchange with the phone wedged to his ear while he continued with his roller] & explained.  He made some calls & promised a replacement would be there in 30 minutes.    Well, even if it was an hour, it wouldn’t be too bad – we’d still make it.

We ate our lunch on the hot, windy hillside, being bombarded by hundreds of tiny black flies that made straight for our ears [the car, of course, being an oven]. [Another good reason for my habitual bandana – and Mike’s large cotton hanky – soon wrapped round our heads]

Three hours later, long after we had finished our water, the replacement car arrived.  By which time we had progressed through “well, we might not have time to shower & change” to “if we are really lucky we might make the second half”.

Not pausing to see if the recovery vehicle had managed to load our broken Toyota (we didn’t care – sorry) we shot off.  Fangio, aka Michael Stewart, at the wheel.  Fortunately the dashboard was shaped so the passenger couldn’t see the speedometer.  So the passenger sat, trying not to cling on to her seatbelt, exclaiming breathlessly “My goodness, what stunning landscape!!”  “Gosh, that’s an old aquaduct!”  “Oh, look, this is where they crossed two rivers!”  “No wonder General Patten chose this route” as the various features of this famous old road shot past at little less than the speed of light. 

Arrival on the outskirts of Palermo slowed us down, as we hit the peak of the rush hour.  (You have to understand, the rush hour in Palermo lasts from about 0600 to 2200).  We saw not a single local car without either missing wing mirrors, scraped doors, dented fenders or beaten in lights.  And then there were the scooters

– a two second pause in the traffic – perhaps because of a small prang at a roundabout, of which we saw three in half an hour – and about 40 of these surge forward, weaving in and out of the smallest gaps.

We found our way to our hotel [naturally on the second floor with a wonky lift], got directions to their nearby car park, left the car,  dived into to our room, flung ourselves in the shower, dressed and practically ran to the theatre.  There were, indeed, elegant Italians, enjoying a slow and cooling glass of wine in the interval, but I was a woman with a mission – and a voucher to be exchanged for tickets upon our early arrival.  A smartly dressed attendant informed me the box office was closed, so I couldn’t pick up our tickets.  Trying hard not to cry, I stuttered about a broken down car.  He smiled, told me to stay right there and spoke to his superior.  The voucher did not give any seat numbers, but they found us two excellent places in the stalls.  It was clear that they were all extremely proud of Massimo and would do anything to help those who wished to attend – Ticketmaster, take note!

So we managed to enjoy the second half, despite thirst & tiredness, and the theatre is, indeed, absolutely magnificent. 

The attendants in frock coats

We had a less than average supper in a tourist alley & fell into bed.

However, Antonio made it clear that A. the hire would be free and B. we didn’t have to be back till late afternoon.  So after breakfast, still removing small black flies from our ears,  we took a different, equally magnificent road back, arriving at the South coast in Agrigento, finally seeing the Temples close to which we had originally seen from the sea.

Heigh ho.  I went to see Antonio the next day, and he told me he had a problem.  We had returned the second car [delivered grubby, ½ a tank of fuel, passenger window didn’t work] without filling up the tank and the company wished to charge us €50 - €30 for the fuel and €20 for “service”…..  I spluttered “SERVICE???”.  He said “leave it with me”.  Mike and I agreed we would not see him out of pocket and would pay for the fuel, but were sincerely disinclined to fork out for the latter.    However, when we went  to tell him this, he said it was fine, there would be no further charges.  I don’t know if he absorbed it or told the car hire company where to go, but we are most  grateful.

Next year, Mike is getting a pair of socks or a chart of the Greek Islands…..