Marsala
St Barbara's Web Diary
Peter & Sue Goldsmith
Tue 19 May 2009 07:54
37:47.34N 12:26.46E
12.00 17th May
Making predictions and putting them to print is potentially unwise. We were
not in Mazara for 2 days and the weather was not set fair leaving there.
True we left in calm conditions however we had not gone far and black clouds
followed by thunder was the order of the day. We stopped outside the harbour
and ate our lunch, had a long protracted conversation with the harbour
master, loosely translated by the radio operator at Trapani Coast Radio
station and were finally waved to a berth. The rain had stopped, at least
for a moment.
Safely berthed, we were planning to explore but we had more rain so stayed
on board and had an outstanding dinner of prawns followed by baked sea
bream.
Thanks Amy.
Today we woke to the right sort of weather, sunshine and clear skies. A
quick breakfast and off to explore. Marsala is the home of the well known
Sicilian wine. The marina sits right outside the distillery and bottling
plant and it can be smelt on the air. Unfortunately this was a Sunday so it
was closed up and this proved to be the case for most of the shops. Not for
the Sicilians the Sunday opening hours we have come to expect and it
included the supermarket!
We walked through the pretty town, along with most of the population and we
even attended the church service (for about 5 minutes). Shopping was
successful with a bottle of local Marsala after a comprehensive tasting
session. A small shop produced excellent ham, salami and cheese and a
roadside stall had all the fruit and veg we needed so with nothing to stop
us we had some lunch and decided to get on with our longer passage to
Sardinia.