Tuesday, our first full day on Sicily in the little hill top city of Noto. I was up at eight. Of course, there was no Internet so there was not very much to do. I set some things up and did a little posting from my phone, but that was about all that I could do. It was rather stressful because no one was responding to us and we have never had working Internet here so we did not know how bad this was likely to be. You expect that when you arrive at a new place that the Internet will be on, tested and working for you at least upon arrival. Hiccups happen, a lot, but they should be working when you get there! They have had unlimited time to make sure that that part was working.
We were very pleased when the Internet came on between ten and eleven this morning. We got everyone online and started doing some catching up. Now we can really start to get settled. And we know that we do not have to find a new house right away! That would be a major problem, of course.
Around noon I finally had a chance to set out on a hike around the city. We need supplies and I have to figure out where to get them. I had been out for a walk last night and came across nothing at all, so that was not promising.
I walked all over town, doing a lot of kilometres. I got down to Corse Vittorio, the main street in the city, and made it the entire length of the city! At least of the old town. On the way I found the big cathedral that is the main attraction in the city. And the amazing baroque city hall. And next to that was a large tourist information centre, although they were pretty much just into talking to one another and did not seem very interested in the fact that a family had just moved in for three months. They handed me a paper map and seemed to feel that their entire, large, three person office was only there to hand out a paper map. Odd. I did ask, though, and they showed me some stuff in town and where some mini-markets were.
I set off on a very long walk which got me to the edge of town just fifteen minutes after the only market on that side of town had closed and would not open again for two more hours. I took a picture of their open times, told Dominica and set off to walk back home. That really sucked.
I got quite the walk in, though, and got home and spent a few hours doing work in the new upstairs office. This is my first chance to start to actually catch up in weeks. I need the quiet, alone time of the office.
In the late afternoon, we went to the market after it had opened and did our first real grocery shopping. We got as much as we could carry, maybe a little more, and hoofed it back to the house. Now we have ingredients and can cook. And now we have bottled water so we can drink since we can’t waste the water in the house because we need that for toilets and showers and stuff. Having so little water is a major issue.
That was an exhausting walk, and I had done it twice (plus more.) I was super tired. The stairs up to my office are a flight and a half of very narrow, very stone stairs that wear you out quite quickly, too. I am getting a workout.
Dominica made pasta for dinner, what else would we have for our first homemade meal on Sicily?
We did discover that there is a market right around the corner from us, but that it is only open in the mornings, so we will check that out tomorrow if we can. There is a bakery near there as well. Hopefully that means simple, fresh, daily bread is available.
The evening was spent posting, writing and getting the house in order. Tonight we hooked up the Amazon FireTV in the living room and got Full House up and running so we started watching that as we only get to watch it when we are not in the United States and the girls love the show and have been waiting to watch it again since, we think, Romania. A long time, no matter what.