We started our morning off with breakfast that was included with our room- which in he way of Italian breakfasts, wasn’t too terrible. Blood orange juice, toast a couple pieces of salami and cheese and a piece of cake.    
   
We had a four hour drive across the southern coast of Sicily to reach the cities of the East coast and I’d like to blame the lack of pictures on the fact that Norah and Kegan were sleeping the whole time because I told him I was going to call him out on the blog-but the fact is, there just wasn’t much to see or photograph other than the rolling hills of vines and mountains and the occasional small town along the way. 

    
    
    We did spot a McDonalds and against Kegan’s advice I went through the drive through to get a Happy Meal for Norah.
    
The hamburger was way better here than in the US. It’s probably actually real meat over here because the burger was like 100 calories more than back home.

 I will say that American gas stations need to up their coffee game though compared to Italian gas stations. There is no coffee machine station with paper cups. There is a counter and ceramic cups and an awesome espresso machine with a barista. This is something I wouldn’t mind bringing back to the US with us. At this point it’s close to one of the only things! 🙂

 

   
    
  They call this area The Baroque South because a huge earthquake levels the entire area in 1693. Therefore, all of the buildings being rebuilt reflected the style of the time.  
    
    
Right outside of Syracuse, a pack of dogs decided our car looked fun to chase. Haha

We stopped outside the city and got gas station sandwiches. Lol

   

 We arrived at the Greek archiologic center 30 minutes before they closed so we basically had to speed walk through the park. I took Norah’s picture in the tree tunnel , then she wanted to take our picture.  

 Not bad…  

    Thee famous Ear of Dionysius. Dionysius was he king of Syracuse (not the goddess of wine which happens to be my favorite Dionysius). This cave it named such because they say he used to place his enemy prisoners inside this cave because of the acoustics- you can hear even a whisper from inside loud and clear. Ancient spy tactics. 
This area is called the Latomes. It’s a giant quarry where all of the  stone for the Greek amphitheater and the ancient city was mined by prisoners.   
And more hills. Lol

    
An Ancient Greek theater from the 500’s BC. Plays. Theater, poetry- all overlooking an ocean view. It was a very peaceful place…

  With amazing views  
    
 Norah was most excited about drinking out of the public water fountain.   

 The peace of the Greek theater explains why when the Romans conquered 600 years later, they had to build a Roman amphitheater just a few steps away. The setup on the side of the mountain would never allow for flooding the floor for naval battles and there was no underground channels under the floor that they would raise the gladiators. What I get out of this is that the Romans weren’t so into poetry. Lol

   
    

Lots of strange plants and trees in this area. 

 
  

As we left Syracuse you could begin to see Mt. Etna on the horizon. 

 We arrived at our apartment for the evening. Around 6pm- Norah was excited because there was cable. She watched an Italian cartoon she has loved called Masha e Oso (Masha and the Bear).

  

  

  

It was a fine example of the kind of decor one can make out of IKEA products. haha  it was a comfy bed for the first time since we got here! I didn’t want to leave!

Our host Federico recommended the town of Brucoli for Pizza so we headed into town.

The town sits right on the ocean… Like the sidewalk ends in water right here. Norah wanted to see the dolphins (??…no idea)

 She brought us fresh buffalo mozzarella and smoked as well (this area is famous for it).   Norah got “chips”. So it was a good day.
  And they had a chalkboard for kids so she was very excited about this place.  
We went back and did a load of Laundry and slept like babies 🙂