Sicily. Beautiful Med sailing! Fantastic Islands and People. Enjoy!
Closed Captions (CC):
this is the second part
of our italian adventure sicily
grab your popcorn and sit back and enjoy
so after much to do around volcanoes
it was time for us to head south
to sicily and boy did we get a reception
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look at the color of that water
now that's blue
what a welcome to sicily the water is
absolutely
gorgeous you see it's clear blue you can
see the bottom
which is six seven meters down dived the
anchor
that's dug in like a tick that
manson supreme anchor is just every type
of ground
that we've put it in it's held and it's
held well
i'm really impressed manson if you're
watching this
this is an endorsement and i don't
really make a lot of endorsements
but a brilliant anchor really pleased
with it
so a little fishing port over there
and last night we wandered up to that
white building with the green
tops if you can see that
behind david and had a couple of beers
took the dogs as it was nice and cool in
the evening
it's a little fishing village a little
marina
a bar that closes at 7 30 in the evening
on the
on the key side couldn't believe it we
turned up eight of us
to have a few beers at quarter past
seven
and the woman said no we're closing in
15 minutes and probably shut the door
so he went and spent our money elsewhere
strange there's a lighthouse up there
a rather loud french boat right next to
us
on charter
a lovely french trolley up there
fantastic lines it's got can't really
see it from here but
very classic looking shape
and then we headed for palermo
palermo is one of the biggest commercial
ports in sicily
as we entered the port a little chap
came up to us in his rib
and asked us if we'd got a book in
obviously he was trying to
well flog his uh marina births
they franchised the births out in a lot
of marinas we'd already booked so
we didn't need his surfaces so he
scooted off
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oh
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once we've got clearance for our marina
birth
and had been assigned to us we lined
ourselves up
into the wind if you watch this piece of
footage you'll see that we're doing
something different
there's a reason behind it but while you
watch it think what that reason could be
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having little or no tides there's no
major current running in this harbour
but let's explain why we did it like
this
so here's the reason we didn't go in
like this reversing in
downwind of the slip coming across the
other bones
and then backwards into our birth for
this reason
we'd have got to this point and the wind
would have been forced us
onto the downwind boats if anything had
gone wrong would have crashed straight
into them
so what we did was we reversed downwind
brought the back of the boat in close
and allowed the wind to catch the bell
and bring us round as we then straighten
up towards the birth
the wind is round now pushing us on the
nose
and the boat always pivots better with
the wind pushing the nose around
it makes for a much more controlled
entrance into the berth the other reason
is reversing into the wind will just
slow down progress through the water and
it's water over the rudder that gives
you steerage
doing it the other way gives you more
steerage so the main town of palermo
city of palermo is over there and we'll
show you some clips of our
excursions in a bit the city was founded
in 734 bc by the phoenicians
as the city of ziz palermo then became a
possession of carthage
two greek colonies were established
known collectively as panoramas
or all port the carthaginians used this
name on their coins after the fifth
century bc
as panelists the town became part of the
roman republic and empire for over a
thousand years from 831 to 1072 the city
was under arab rule
during the emirate of sicily when the
city first became a capital
the arab shifted the greek name into
balaam which is arabic
the route for palermo's present-day name
following the norman reconquest palermo
became the capital of a new kingdom
from 11 30 to 1816
the kingdom of sicily and the capital of
the holy roman empire
under emperor frederick ii and king
conrad iv
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do
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our next anchorage we found by chance
and it was just
beautiful
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foreign
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hmm
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um
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we left that beautiful anchorage we
showed you last time and continued
anti-clockwise
around sicily to port drapani
busy fishing port
there's a fish market in there there's
another market up here i'll show you in
a minute
fruit market as well as a fish market
here
look at the size of them melons now
those melons
those melons there amazing fresh fruit
look at tomatoes
a few jellyfish in the harbour this
morning
big ones the rhizostoma plumo goes by
many names barrel jellyfish dustbin lid
jellyfish
and even frilly mouth jellyfish to name
a few it's known not just by the blue
ring
of the umbrella but the sheer size of up
to two feet
wide the barrel jellyfish is so large in
fact that young fish and small crabs
seek shelter under its mildly stinging
tentacles
now here we are at tropini i'll put a
long
lap down here anchored in the main
harbour
marina's in there
rather expensive for what it is
very commercial
that's the harbour entrance over there
big barge
teasing eternity hank it over by the
fort
after a couple of days we continued
roughly due
southwest to favignana there was some
strong winds coming in from the north
and we wanted to be somewhere that was
really sheltered
the landing spot walked into town
horrible selfie
we found a tap and wet the dogs down
they've had a paddle as well but
for many years the population relied on
the tuna industry
stringing great nets across the bays
with these anchors
unfortunately they overfished and now
all that remains is a sea of used and
broken anchors
an empty cannery and process implant
and a few tranquil bays and of course no
tuna with the tuna gone the locals now
rely heavily on tourism
high-speed ferries now bring people
across from sicily or the mainland
and unfortunately tourism brings its own
problems for the island
one of these issues is the income is
very seasonal
many of the shops cafes bars
bric-a-break shops and
novelty goods all closed down over the
winter the place becomes a ghost town
given the island's historical
significance
we could really make some money out of
it if enough people just knew
about the history this is the
passenger ship lampedusa
[Applause]
no it's not on fire that's the pollution
it's putting out
and you can see right across
the mainland of sicily thick
acrid black smoke
he's also on a collision course for us
with a cpa of
just 150 meters so um we're going to
keep an eye on him
that is unbelievable
how many thousand miles did we have to
do to put that amount of co2 and
noxious gases and soot into the
atmosphere
a few circumnavigations i bet
from the island we travel further south
heading east
to mazara we only stayed one night
briefly taking the dogs ashore
before heading on again
to le carter or licotta depending on how
you pronounce it i guess
having sailed most of the day we decided
to pull in behind a headland
and set out some winds that were coming
very strongly from the west
we all held okay and this was part of
the footage we put in our anchoring
video if you remember
le cata moreno has good protection from
winds from all direction
and those notorious mediterranean storms
that happened during the winter
we had a real good look around and we
met some of the people liverpool there
all year round
in fact we enjoyed it so much we stayed
a few days
the marina has some really good
facilities well kept clean
tidy and the marine arrows are very
helpful
in the town which is only a couple of
hundred meters away
all the shops that you could need even a
little
the liverpool community there had
organised a barbecue for the sunday
evening
and so they invited us along via their
facebook page
and we took part in a traditional finish
game it's a
bit like piton you have to knock over
sticks and then they put them up in a
different place
you couldn't really get the rules but he
seemed to have fun david enjoyed himself
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after leaving liquor we went on to
marina ragouza
it was a kind of soulless place and
absolutely vast
we decided we wouldn't want to stay
there for the winter
and then our chief navigator linda found
this place
it was a stunning hidden little
anchorage
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two days later we moved on the island of
capo perezo
it's as far south and as far east as you
can go
in sicily as a fantastic four
the statue of the holy madola and the
tuna factory
went out of business 20 years ago
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rounding the island we were now
technically in the aegean
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it's got a bunch of girls around
yes
[Laughter]
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we anchored behind the island for one
night and then needing some ac
and desperately needing some water we
called into a marina for one night
before moving on to sarah coos
there we are sarah coos norwegian spirit
out there
we are
out there by that cat
norwegian dawn there
just tied up the uh just hold up the
dingus
time for a coffee and a croissant
syracuse or
syracusa is located on the southeast
corner of sicily
an island off the coast of italy there's
a large bay or lagoon
and in the northeast corner a small
island
covered in historic monuments
coffee and a croissant on the front
little bar here and now we're off to
look at some
architecture and some history
let's see here
in 1693 an earthquake struck parts of
southern italy
near sicily calabrea and malta on
january the 11th
around 2100 local time the earthquake
was preceded by a damaging foreshock
on the 9th of january the main quake had
an estimated magnitude of 7.4
the most powerful in italian recorded
history
and causing the death of sixty thousand
people syracuse was flattened
and so everything you see here was built
after that date
i guess the eu grant must have run out
it's never been finished
tempo of apollo is dated to the
beginning of the 6th century bc
and was therefore the most ancient doric
temple in sicily
more or less it was once a byzantine
church
from which period the front steps and
traces of the central door
are still preserved it was then an
islamic mosque during the
emirate of sicily
beyond the temple there's a huge market
sending fresh fruit
vegetables fish and meat from the local
area
at one end of the market there are a
series of spice stalls
selling spices from well just about
everywhere
from cinnamon to nutmeg peppers to
capers
the fountain of diana is a monumental
fountain from 1907
by ghoulia machete with the
collaboration of his sculptor's son
mario located in the piazza archimedes
in saracludes
the fountain faces south and highlights
the figure of diana
with a bow and a dog the attributes of
the goddess hunting
protector of autogena in greek times
the fountain is unusual in that it's
constructed from concrete and not
carved stone
uh
the temple of athena is a doric temple
built
in sarah cruz in the 5th century bc by
the tyrant
galileo after his victory over the
carthaginians
in the battle of himera the temple was
preceded by a cult site which dated back
to the 8th century bc with an altar
discovered in a later excavation
the temple was converted to a christian
place of worship
and parts of it are still found
incorporated into the walls
on the left side of the demono some
columns of local limestone
and the local style bone on which they
stood
but still remain visible
sunset in another 20 minutes
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so
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do
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yeah actually i think you got it
so
the city gateway built by dionysus the
great which remains visible
is the base of the two quadrangular
towers over eight meters on each side
which probably allowed access to the
road that fought and connected the
temple of apollo
and that of athena the gate was
discovered in 1977
and it assumes a certain importance due
to the fact
that the islet is the only remnant of
the ancient dionysian foundations
i managed to find these artists
impressions of what the gateway looked
like
online as you can see the porter or
gateway
leads up to the tempo of apollo
just 10 minutes away from the city
center there's an ancient greek
amphitheatre which is
remarkably well preserved apparently
it's one of the best in the area
we weren't able to visit it due to the
constraints of time
and of course kovid kovid19 there's also
the ancient caves
the ear of dionysus is one of these if
you get the chance
to visit saracus or saracusa we'd highly
recommend it
after two weeks of being anchored in
sarah coos
we're headed back down to masami then
puerto paulo
and back to liquita or la carta
depending on how you say it
a few days before we be due to leave
masami the girls and i decided to have a
day out in the nearest town
the marina very kindly enters their car
so we set off bright and early one
morning
and went into the ancient city of notto
we climbed up the steps to go and have a
look inside the cathedral
inside the cathedral was this scale
model made out of wood the original
cathedral had been destroyed in an
earthquake in 1636
so this was obviously rebuilt the
painted ceilings were absolutely amazing
the stained glass windows seem to
reflect the light
completely around the cathedral defined
as the capital of baroque in 2002 its
historic centre
was declared a world heritage site by
unesco
you can see why this ceiling is inside
the church of san demonico
look at the richness there we thought
these were painted steps but on closer
inspection
they've actually got material laid on
the risers
the architecture throughout the city was
absolutely amazing
we had a lovely day
it's our last night in mars and mimi so
we decided we're going to go out for a
beer
practicing in the car park is one of
these silent dance troops
really quite funny to watch
when we get to the old town there's
another wedding going on
the groom is pretending to polish the
hubcaps of this alfa romeo with the
wedding dress
well with the end of the season fast
approaching and the weather becoming
less predictable
it's time to head back to our winter
shame birthing leave mars and maybe it's
a lovely place
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you can see our dinghy is tied on the
front once we get into some open water
we'll bring it round the back and put it
back up on the davits
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okay
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so
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do
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with very light winds at 12 to 14
degrees apparent
we weren't going to be able to sail on
this part of the trip
we decided to go round to this place
we've been there before
the unfinished marina of porto paolo
there were strong westerlies forecast
and quite a big southwest swell
so we tucked ourselves into the corner
for the night
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[Music]
hi there hi folks hope you enjoyed the
video
that was the last of this year's videos
it was because it's new year's eve and
uh we're just about to finish putting
this one together
and then upload it um thank you so much
to our patrons who've been
a tremendous support this year we're
we're very grateful we mean that
most sincerely um thank you to the
subscribers
all your comments good and bad
um it's been a funny all year and we'd
like to have gone a lot further but
hey ho it's one of the things well in
some ways not being able to go further
has made us stop more frequently so
we've been able to see more things
yeah we have and we've had some great
sailing we've had the shoot up a lot
this year so um
anyway it's uh it's not so much sunny le
carter
as cold and rainy lakota
um oscar's just about to go out for his
walk aren't ya
good afternoon walk yeah good boy reigns
just ease up a bit so
yeah he can get out so just leaves us to
say
happy new year happy new year yeah and
hope that next year
is much better for all of you yeah
exactly yeah
so from us to on boarding paved us
happy 2021 yeah
see you later sell safe bye
you