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| Another beautiful day....sunny and warm. After our regular breakfast at "our bar", we head out for Castelvetrano...a town in the southwest corner of Sicily. We are to have lunch with Zeke Freeman, a young American we met in Bethesda last month at Bella Italia, a store that sells all manner of Italian products, when he was promoting the very expensive and delicious olive oil (Olio Verde) of his fiancee's family. He invited us to lunch at the Becchina family estate to see the operations and to become familiar with the rental properties that they are developing. En route to Castelvetrano, we make a return visit to the Greek temple at Segesta. The drive from Trapani on the autostrada is very pleasant...rolling farm land with the mountains of the interior in the distance. This is one of the most beautiful temples in the world...almost complete, except for the roof, beautifully sited on top of a low hill with higher mountains in the background. We had visited here nine years ago and this was the place Diana was most looking forward to seeing again. We are not disappointed....it is still amazing. The big difference is that there were a lot more people visiting this time....the parking lot is full and the bar area is crowded--but the temple is luckily quite empty and we spend our time without bumping into a lot of other people. We then take the shuttle bus to the top of the hill to visit the Greek theater which has a beautiful position looking out over the hills toward the sea in the distance--the theater is in excellent shape and the views are magnificent. The ride to Castelvetrano takes about 45 minutes on the autostrada.....we make one misstep due to the fact that I had misread the correct exit to take, but we recover and arrive at the Becchina estate on time. We drive inside the walled compound which is planted with olive trees for as far as we can see. The house is magnificent...set behind a large, beautiful lily pond. It has been restored beautifully--both inside and out. We meet the head of the family, Luigi Becchina--who used to be an antique dealer in Switzerland--and his daughter, Gabriella (who studied for her doctorate in Art History at Columbia in New York). We have a very pleasant lunch...pasta with asparagus and a jolt of hot peppers, local wine, salad, and a delicious dish of ricotta cheese with a fruit syrup. After lunch, we tour the accommodations in the main house and the new apartments being built in an adjoining out building.....everything looks very lovely. The big problem I see with developing tourism in this area is that it not well known and the area's scenery doesn't favorably compare with other more famous and established areas of Sicily. We then take a drive into the town to visit the "big" project. The Becchina's have purchased one of the grand palaces in Castelvetrano and have an ambitious plan to develop a shopping/tourism/commercial/educational center in the palazzo. Right now, the project is in its early stages....the hotel rooms are being worked on first....but the scope of the project is quite breathtaking. We say good bye to Zeke and Gabriella there and head out of town....but first we stop to buy a loaf of the famous "pane nero" (dark bread) of Castelvetrano. We head for La Bottega del Pane (recommended in one of our guide books) and just catch the owner before he closes. It turns out that he has spent a couple of years in Los Angeles and speaks a bit of English. He is very interested in seeing the mention in the guide book...it is one he is not familiar with, although his walls are covered with articles from other magazines and guides. We promise to send him a copy when we get back home. He offers us tastes of some of his cookies....one is fig filled which Diana loves and the other is spicy with fennel flavorings, which I am fond of. We buy some cookies and bread and head back to Trapani--a much faster trip than one we had two days ago from Mazara del Vallo. Back in Trapani, we head out to find some postcards and souvenirs...we have been unable to find any attractive cards and it is our last night in Trapani. We are not having much luck--we do find a nice book about the area written in Italian--but at the last minute, we find a store with a nice selection of postcards. We decide to eat our last dinner in Trapani at the Slow Food-recommended restaurant just across the street from the hotel. It is a wine bar/restaurant--very attractive in an untraditional way--sort of a rustic feel. The menu was full of great sounding dishes....slightly modern variations on traditional Sicilian recipes. I had a flan made of artichokes with a subtle cream topping and a great rendition of fish cuscus; Diana had a caponata served with grilled local cheese--primo sale--followed by a tasty risotto with gamberoni. For dessert, Diana has a dish of strawberries and I have an okay panna cotta...unusual to find this dish this far south. The waiter picks out a nice wine for us....a Forti Terre di Sicilia--a pleasant white from the local Trapani wine cooperative. All in all, a very satisfying dinner with style and a slightly different feel than the rest of our Trapani meals. We only have to cross the street and take the elevator up to our room. Tomorrow we leave Trapani and head for Palermo. |
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