Return to Palermo: Finding the right tool for the job, again

May 23, 2016

Our cycling tour essentially ended last night. We still have seven miles ahead of us, but they're all downhill - Monreale sits almost a thousand feet above central Palermo. Today is all about tourism and packing for home. It starts with breakfast at a cafe on the duomo plaza - Monreale is the only spot on the tour where our room did not include breakfast. It is warm but breezy outside, but a pleasant experience to enjoy our pastries and coffee outdoors for a change.

Monreale Cathedral formally opens at 8:30, but we walk over at 8:15, see that the gate is open, and go on in. The few staff milling around don't seem to mind, so for awhile we have one of the great cathedrals of the world to ourselves. It is an awesome experience. By the time we leave 90 minutes later, the aisles are filled with individuals, tour groups and guides, and a long line of new arrivals is quad up at the entrance.

The cathedral is overwhelming. We've never seen anything like it - all of the wall surfaces are brilliantly tiled with Old and New Testament scenes, saints and seraphim. Every corner you look at is of interest, and everything is different. It is astonishing taken as a whole or in detail, with each area consisting of ever more astonishing detail the further you drill down.

Breakfast on the plaza, waiting for the cathedral to open. It is very windy again this morning - a minute ago one of the shade umbrellas next to us flew out of its stand and went skidding down the street.

These palm trees outside the cathedral are so strange - 150' sticks with a few fronds on top.

I decided that the journal would be more manageable if I split off photos of the cathedral into their own page, so here's a link as a teaser:

Leaving our affittacamera in Monreale. Steep, narrow, just a bit precarious.

Palermo, from the Monreale belvedere - seven miles out, a thousand feet down.

The tree lined boulevard is Via Vittorio Emanuele, the heart of the city and our pathway into it.

Looking back at Porta Felice, the entrance gate at the start of Via Vittorio Emanuele.

The pedestrianized zone, Via Vittorio Emanuele.

There is so much to see in Palermo, but we only have a few hours so we head to the top spot on our list - the Palatine Chapel. Along the way we pass the cathedral, which obviously is worth the time if we had it. Next time, we keep telling ourselves.

The Palatine Chapel proves to be nearly as exceptional as the Monreale Cathedral. It is another Norman mosaic masterpiece, with a style very like the cathedral and representations of all of the same Old Testament themes. It is so interesting that these two exquisite creations were built at about the same time only six miles from each other and that both managed to survive for nearly a thousand years,

I'm not religious and have forgotten everything I learned from my upbringing, but it is impossible not to be moved by these beautiful portrayals of the biblical creation narrative. For the first time in years I find myself curious about these stories and tempted to reeducate myself a bit - just what is Jacob's ladder about, and what is the story involving Abraham, Rebecca and the camels? I'd like to know more background and context, and then go look again. Next time.

As with the cathedral, I threw all of our photos from the palatine Chapel into a separate subpage:

Nearly all the monuments and tourists are strung out along Vittorio Emanuele, but it is equally fascinating to wander off into the side streets of Palermo like this one.

We stopped off at a street market on the way back to our room, to pick up a melon to enhance tomorrow's breakfast.

The bike store that bailed us out by beating Rachael's Bike Friday into submission - once to pound the handlebar stem into place at the start of the tour, and then again to hammer it back out a the end so we could suitcase it for the flight home. I can't believe that both times I forgot to take the camera and get a photo of the hammer move in action.

Today's ride: 6 miles (10 km)
Total: 1,343 miles (2,161 km)

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