A rather challenging night last night for Irv. I think I mentioned in an earlier post that he had fallen off his bike into a ditch on the first day of cycling (shades of our bike trip in Holland). Well turns out he really did a number on it, because he wasn’t able to cycle the rest of the trip! (Again - a repeat of Holland!) Last night, after having walked all day on it, and then went for a short walk near the hotel, all of a sudden he had a very deep pain in his thigh. I went and got ice from the front desk and he iced it for a time. But when he went to lie down in bed, he couldn’t get his leg to straighten without a great deal of pain. So he ended up sleeping sitting up in the chair, with half of the duvet over him and half over me! Probably a good thing we had to get up at 3:00 anyway to get to the airport for our flight to Catania.
Made it to the airport and our flight, albeit very slowly. Arrived just before noon, but then had drama getting our rental car. Turned out that Richard, driver extraordinaire, was not allowed to drive. His license expires on his birthday, which is tomorrow, and he hadn’t received his new license before we left. But he did have his temporary paper license that they give you till your real one comes. Well the rental company wouldn’t accept that. Irv had gotten his international drivers license to be the second driver, but with his bum leg, not sure how much driving he can do, especially since it’s a standard. So Merrilee ended up signing on as a driver and driving us from the airport up to our AirBnB which is about a half hour out of Catania way up Mt Etna way. It was a bit tricky getting there, to say the least, including a very rough road for the last km or so.
The place is lovely - an old home way up on the slopes of Mt. Etna that has been refurbished somewhat and has an amazing view! Its name is Casa Etnea and we are staying in the Volcano suite! The only drawback is that it is so challenging to get here. Our host, Giuseppe, was there to greet us and gave us some great tips on what to do and see in the area.
We headed back into Trecastagnia, the nearest town, to check out the little festival they had going on, with lots of interesting artisans work and food booths. We snagged some lunch - delicious arancini - and wandered around a bit, then decided to head to pick up some essential grocs before heading back to the flat. A quiet evening in and an early turn-in, as it had been a very long day!