Trip to Malta & Sicily - Part 2

Man, 4:45am came really, really quickly. :/

BUUUUUT, today was the day for Sicily, so we got over our tiredness pretty easily.

There's a company (Virtu Ferries) that not only does just ferry rides from Malta to Sicily, but also guided tours. It was €117 per person for the roundtrip ferry ride, and the all-day guided tour. We chose the "Syracuse & Iblean Gems" trip. MOST people choose the Mt. Etna & Taormina trip. However, we're SO GLAD we chose to do Syracuse. I'll explain why later.

So, we're up at 4:45am, and have to walk over to a nearby hotel, where a van picked us and a few other people up, to take us to the docks. The Virtu Ferry is actually a catamaran, but it's quite large. I think it held almost 500 people, and it had two snack counters, a casino, and a gift shop on the main deck (no telling what was in the "first class" deck). The ferry left at 6:30am, and it's about an hour and a half to get to Sicily (they're only 50 miles apart).





It was a nice enough ferry. We all had breakfast, then James took a nap while Josh & I played Fluxx.

(btw, you must buy Fluxx, if you don't already have it...it is AWESOME)

(btw #2 - I won, 2 out of 3. In your face, Aycock!)

Hokay, so like I said earlier, we chose the Syracuse tour. I had no desire to go see Mt. Etna. Yes, it's famous, blah blah blah. I've seen volcanoes before. Hell, I've seen a volcano erupt before. You've seen one, you've seen all. PLUS, (and we didn't find this out until later), Mt. Etna can be a huge tourist trap. The tour will take you to the mountain, but if you want to go to the top, you have to pay another €20, and if you want to take the cable car up to the VERY top, that's another €20ish per person. No, thank you.

The Etna tours were done on huge double-decker coach buses. I think there were 2 or 3 buses for just the one tour. Ours, being not as popular, was just a regular coach, and we only had 21 people. I was very thankful for that. Plus, our lunch was included (and on the other tours, it wasn’t).

The tours are also multi-lingual. Our tour was English & Russian. Quite a combination, eh? Our tour guide was a woman who was from Moscow, but married to a Sicilian. I guess the area is a hot spot for Russians?? I don’t know, but it was fun to listen to all of ‘em talk....presumably about borscht & Communism....

The first thing we noticed when we got to Sicily is how much drier the air was. It was still warm & sunny, but it was such a relief to not be sweating QUITE as much. Plus, even though it was a pretty dry place, there was a LOT more green around. Weird, since it's only 50 miles from Malta.



Anywho - first stop, Syracuse.


Archimedes Square



The Cathedral of Syracuse on the Piazza Duomo

Have I mentioned before that I hate birds? Ok, I don’t hate birds, but I’m terrified that they’re going to poop on me while they’re flying overhead. There were about a million stupid seagulls flying around the Piazza, and the entire time we’re walking around, I’m doing a side-to-side dance trying to avoid being directly under these stupid things. I must have looked like a crazy person, but I care not....I didn’t get pooped on. (next time we go on a trip, I’m taking an umbrella to hold over myself the entire time we’re outside - I don’t CARE if I look like one of those people).

We went into the Syracuse Church for a little while. It was pretty, but what was really cool were the human bones on display. I’m assuming they were the bones of Saints, but who can read Italian?? (okay, yes, millions of Italians, but I’m not one of ‘em). On second thought, it was probably Latin....same thing, still can't read it.


We had about an hour and a half to kill while in Syracuse. So, what do you do when you’re in Italy? You eat gelato. Never mind that it was 10:30am. Josh had strawberry, I had lemon, and James had chocolate (although apparently James has chocolate gelato once a day in Malta...lush).

I definitely won the flavor contest. The strawberry was good, but the lemon was AWESOME!!! But, it was soooooo lemon-y, that I could only eat about 2/3 of it. Don't care, still worth it.

So, James and I are walking in front of Josh, while we're all eating our gelato. We're walking along the sidewalk on the edge of the city, overlooking the water. We stop to talk about something. James and I turn back to look at Josh.

Hilarity ensues.

Josh is standing there, eating his gelato. He's got it all over his shirt, all over his mustache, all over his CHEEK, dripping down his neck, dripping down his hand. He looks like a hairy 4 year old (or a mentally-challenged adult), trying to eat his ice cream. It was probably the funniest he's ever looked. He looked so pathetic, but so happy at the same time. Of COURSE I didn't get a picture of it, because he had the camera (and I'm pretty sure the camera strap also had gelato on it). Rest assured, it was awesome.

Anyway, we wander around the town some more. Syracuse ended up being Josh's favorite city from the day.







An hour and a half just wasn’t enough time there. Especially since I spent 20 minutes trying to find a bathroom. :/ It was starting to get kinda hot, though, and I could feel myself cooking - so, it was nice to get back on the air conditioned bus (god, I’m such an old lady sometimes....).

After Syracuse, it was on to lunch - although it was another hour and fifteen til we got to our lunch stop. It was a really nice drive thru the Sicilian countryside, though. Our guide talked most of the way (five minutes in English, five minutes in Russian), talking about Sicilian life.





So, as I said, lunch was included. And this was hands-down, the BEST lunch we have EVER had. It was held near the town of Ragusa, outside, by a lake, next to the restaurant. There was also an Italian Harley meet-up going on at the same time. They all seemed pretty drunk (and high - there was definitely some weed smoking going on), and they thought we were the funniest people in the world. Couldn’t understand what they were saying, but I KNOW they were laughing at us. Not in a nasty way, just more of a “haha, look at the crazy gringos!” A bunch of ‘em even let some of the people on our group sit on the bikes to take pictures (insert eye roll here).



Anyway, lunch was by the water. It was all-you-could-eat, and best of all, all-you-could-drink wine. The three of us must have gone thru a whole bottle each. (The Aycocks know how to get their money's worth). First off, antipasto. Plates of spicy olives, sundried tomatoes (love), eggplant caponata (I normally don’t like eggplant, but this was amazing), bread (which actually was the only thing that wasn’t that great), salami, and cheese. Then, they brought out little bread pockets stuffed with onion & cheese. Then, they brought out a sort of stromboli filled with tomato sauce & parsley.

Following that, the pasta course. Penne in tomato sauce with fresh cheese. Now, any of you who know the Mister, knows that he’s not a pasta fan (he doesn’t trust the way it wiggles....his words, not mine). He’s ok with penne, farfalle, angel hair - anything small (he cuts up the angel hair - what was I saying earlier about him being a hairy 4 year old?). So, because this was penne, he was fine with trying it. It was TO DIE FOR!!! He said it was the best pasta he’s ever had, and I think all of us ended up having two helpings of it. It was absolutely amazing, and I’m really upset that we don’t live in Sicily....

Next up - the main course. Although, at this point, We’re all pretty full. First, they come out with platters of sauteed mushrooms, apples, and almonds in a lemony sauce. It was for the meat dish, which was sauteed pork. I was the only vegetarian on the trip, but they still made me a special plate. They brought me a plate full of fresh quartered tomatoes, drizzled with olive oil & sea salt. I was a little upset that I was so full, because good lord was that good....

BTW, we’re still drinking our wine.

Next up, was the dessert. They just brought out baskets of fresh apples & apricots, then if you WANTED, they would bring you some cannoli. We actually didn’t have any of it, we were so full. Blurgh.

It was such a relaxing meal. We chatted a little bit with the English couple (they were from Oxford, so we chatted about that - I did a summer semester at Oxford). Then a puppy came to hang out, and I got irritated with the Russian lady across from me that fed the puppy practically a whole pig’s worth of pork chops from off her plate. :/





We were SO full, and happy, and slightly buzzy, that it was such a drag to get back on the bus. I could have laid in the shade and hung out there all afternoon.

But, it we were on our way to the town Marina di Ragusa. This stop (I think we were there for an hour and a half??) was really just to let people have some beach time. We didn’t have our swimsuits, but we were wearing shorts, so we waded along the beach, people-watching for some time. Josh had never been to the Mediterranean before this trip, so he wanted to be able to say that he’s been in the Mediterranean.



I must admit, I got a little cranky during this stop. Once again, we were trying to find a bathroom. I was trying to find a place to get some water, Josh was trying to find a place to get some cigarettes, and we just started snipping away at each other. BUT, our snips are always very short-lived, so we were soon back to our happy Aycock selves.



Our last stop was Modica. This was my favorite town that we visited in Sicily. This town is situated in a deep valley, with buildings going up both sides of the valley. The sun was down (yes!!!!), and it wasn’t really busy - it was around 6pm on a Sunday night, after all.





First stop was to a gift shop to try some Modica chocolate. This ended up being the best kind chocolate that either of us has either had. There were probably 20 different flavors (peperoncino was our favorite). It’s like a crystallized chocolate, that’s a little crunchy. VERY different, but really good - and I’m not even a chocolate person.




Josh walked up 250 steps to go see this church. I did not.


But, we did then go to this church. Mass was going on, and we stepped inside the door, but then I felt weird because I was in shorts & a tank top, so I left. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again - I may be a heathen, but I’m a respectful heathen.

We walked around a little bit longer, stopped into a restaurant to have a rest, and try the local drink (some bitter, orangey liquor cocktail - ick), and it was back to the bus, to go back to the ferry.

The ferry ride back to Malta was not NEAR as nice as the ferry ride to Sicily. There were easily twice as many people, and I think they were all stupid. They were definitely all irritating. But, then the soccer game started on tv, and it calmed down a little bit.



We got back to Malta around 11:30pm. Such a LONG DAY!!!! We grabbed some takeout from a nearby chicken & fry shop. Lexie came over to pick up James to take him back to her place. Josh and I were asleep in bed before they even left the apartment; we were SO EXHAUSTED.

But, man, that trip was awesome. :)

Oechsle Wine & Fish House

Hello, folks.

As promised (maybe a week late, but who's counting), I've got some more bloggy-blogs lined up.

Of course, I couldn't have picked a worse week to start up. Starting on Saturday, the Mister has to work from 6pm to 6am until this coming Friday. It just totally messes up both of our schedules. I end up going to bed late, then wake up late, then don't want to make too much noise during the day, then he wakes up around 1pm and I start our dinner, then he leaves & I try to do all the housework I didn't do during the day when he was asleep. It's 9pm as I'm writing this, and I've got laundry going. I NEVER do housework this late. Boo.

Anywho, I have been meaning to write this blog for a couple weeks now. It, of course, centers around wine tasting.

That seems to be our theme for Germany, doesn't it?

Our friend (and Josh's coworker) Mal, is leaving Germany at the end of May to go to her next base. She told us about this Wine & Fish market (weird combo, eh?) in the nearby city of Trier. She had been there once before with another friend, but decided she needed to return before moving away from Germany. SO, Josh and I, Mal, and our friend (and another coworker) Linda all decided to go to the Oechsle House.

Here's the scoop on this place. It's a fish market. It's also a sit-down restaurant. And, upstairs, it's a wine store. They have 120 different kinds of wine. For €15 per person, you can try all 120 wines. Not only can you try them, but you also pour your own tasting.

After my Bad Dürkheim experience, I was experiencing more than a little trepidation about this Oechsle place.

But, I can learn to control myself when it comes to wine tastings, right??

Even though Trier is only about an hour away from us, we decided to stay the night in Trier, and just take a taxi to and from our hotel to Oechsle. We may be winos, but at least we're responsible winos.

It was raining and cold when we left for Trier. Of course. But, the trip went super-quick. Linda drove us, and she had some Mad Libs in the car, so we had great fun filling some of those out. I forgot how awesome (albeit nerdy) those things could be! I don't think I've played Mad Libs since before I knew dirty words (or at least very many dirty words). As four adults with perverted senses of humor, Mad Libs can be HILARIOUS.

We get to the hotel, but it's too early to check-in, so we decide just to take a cab into Trier and walk around before we go to the wine place.

At this point, I should tell you that poor Mal has the world's worst allergies (at least spring-time allergies). She took some medicine before we left that, unfortunately, turned her into a walking zombie. The first thing we had to do once arriving in the center of Trier was to find a restaurant, so we can eat, get her some caffeine, and hopefully wake her up.

The taxi drops us off in the center of town, and apparently there was some sort of religious...thing...going on at the same time. We had no idea. But, there were people EVERYWHERE. Many of them carrying sticks with crosses w/flowers on them (I'm sure there's a technical term for these really long sticks, but I have no idea what it is). There are nuns everywhere. Groups of people are singing hymns in the streets. That was actually quite lovely. And, a huge group of people are waiting in line in front of a church.

This is only a part of the huge mass of people. And, it was still early. It got REALLY packed later on.

We had NO idea what this was all about. Later, we found out that it was the "Seamless robe of Jesus." It's the robe said to have been worn by Jesus during his crucifixion. It only gets brought out for viewing every-so-often. You can read about it here, because I'm obviously not somebody that should be explaining religious artifacts to the public.

Hokay, anyway, we're on a mission to find caffeine for Mal. Eventually, we just randomly pick a place. We ended up at Ratskeller. Luck was on our side, because it was delicious. It's a Russian/German restaurant situated in the basement of this really old building. Josh ended up getting jägerschnitzel (his usual whenever he can't figure out what else to get), and I got this baked dish of feta, potatoes, spinach, mushrooms, and tomatoes. Mal had about a million espressos, and Linda had one too. Linda had taken the allergy meds also, but it obviously didn't make her FUBAR.

It really was a good meal, and a really cool building. I recommend it to anyone who goes to Trier.

After dinner, some other friends of ours decided to meet up with us. Will is kinda-sorta a coworker (he works in the same career field, just a different division on base). Him and his wife had never been to Trier, so they decided to meet up with us to do the wine tasting. They also brought another couple along. When it comes to wine tasting - the more, the merrier!

Here's their rock-star picture:

Oechsle is just around the corner, but we still had to play Dodge the Nun the whole way there.

Ok, so we get to this building, and it totally seems like an off-the-beaten-path kinda place. The restaurant is hoppin', but there is no one in the tasting room upstairs. It's basically just a gated off section of the restaurant, with rows and rows of wine. There are plaques set up for each wine that can be tasted, listing all of the details about the particular wine and, most importantly, the designated wine number. At the end of each row, there was a big metal cooler, filled with maybe 10 bottles of wine, each with a specific number labeled on the cap. So, whatever number you read about on the board, you would pick out from the cooler to try.

Here's our happy little octet, before the wine extravaganza began.

So, like I said, there are 120 wines to choose from. The first 6 or so where different types of bubbly. For those, the bartender had to pour them. Then, there were 70ish dry whites. Then, 20ish sweet wines. There were only 5 or so dry red wines. Normally, dry reds are the Aycock favorite. But, I have to be honest. German red wine is not so good. The typical dry is the Dornfelder Trocken (trocken just means dry). Dornfelder Halbtrocken (half dry) is good stuff. But trocken? Icken.

We wanted to taste all of the wines there. At least Josh and I did. Mal had done it before (and that ended up not so good for her), and Linda isn't a big drinker. But, Josh and I wanted to try them all. They gave us a sheet of paper with all of the wines listed, and little spots to make notes. SO, we all started doing that. We each had our own little grading system.

I was so determined to NOT get drunk, that I was just pouring little splashes of the wine to taste. Actually, most of the time Josh and I just shared the splash. We wanted to just taste all of the wines, then go back and have full glasses of whatever our favorites were. Hell, I even spit wine out that I didn't care for (which I NEVER do...I'm a swallower).
...............
(I'M TALKING ABOUT WINE HERE, PEOPLE).

Anyway, it sounded like a good plan, right? Well, that is until you realize how completely BORING it all is. We were 30 wines into the dry whites. At this point, my tongue is sore, and my stomach is killing me from all the acid. I'm so OCD, that it takes everything in my power to not just plug away, and get through all the numbers. What if I miss the perfect wine? How can I just pick wines at random to try? What about the numbers? The Numbers!! (seriously, I'm this OCD...it can be a problem).

But, in order for the wine to not eat a hole into my tongue, or stomach, I have to quit for awhile. I had some water, and some genius in our group ordered a cheese plate, that came with a bread basket. Water & bread - the PERFECT addition to a wine tasting!

That perked us up a little bit. :)

Finally, some people got to the sweet side of the wines. We don't like sweet wines, so we avoided it. Until Mal & Linda had us try #91. (we were referring to all of the wines by numbers). Oh, 91. Like a little, sweet kiss from above. This is where we parked it for the rest of the evening. It was really, really delicious white wine - and really not what I would call "sweet".

If you're ever at a fancy-pants wine place (although, I have no idea if you can even get it in the states) you must try this.
Weingut Pfeiffer (Pfeiffer Vineyards)
2010 Riesling
Spätlese (late vintage)
feinherb (just found out this is another term for halbtrocken)

The only reason I know all that info, is because we bought 6 bottles. And at €5.50/each, not too shabby!

Anyway, I digress. It's getting to be late afternoon at this point. More people are at the tasting room at this point. We get to talk to some German business men. That's one thing I really like about being here - getting to talk with locals. They try out their English (which is always pretty decent). We try out our German (which is not at all decent). It's fun! But, I'm still having tongue/stomach acid problems. You know when you eat too many Sour Patch Kids? Yeah, kinda like that. Only multiplied by 10.

Here's one of our "aftermath" tables.

But, everyone else is having a goooood time. The two couples who arrived after we were at the restaurant have left (they didn't have a hotel room booked). So it's back to the four of us! We had been at Oeschle since 1pm-ish, but now it's almost 6pm. I am pretty much stone sober at this point, but the others have a major case of the giggles. It's really quite funny. Except then the piano player starts, and the bartender asks when we're leaving.

:/

Really, I think it's just because they're about to close up (I really do think the wine tasting part closes at 6:30 or so). But, I can't help but be paranoid that he's tired of us being there. At this point, I'm tired of us being there. I need a break from all the wine.

Oeschle allows you to purchase wine, and then pick up later. Good thing, because between the four of us, we've purchased 78 bottles (and only 6 of those were for me & Josh). THANKFULLY, some genius in our group mentions a desire for pizza.

This sounds like the best plan ever. Luckily, in Germany, you can walk 10 paces in any direction and run smack into a local pizzeria.

And we do!

Unfortunately, I can't for the life of me remember the name of the pizza place. But really, they're all variations of the same...Pizza. Pizza Italiano. Delicioso Pizza Italiano. etc. etc. etc.

The food was great. We had a really hot Italian waiter...who was missing all of his front teeth...

But he was hot when he closed his mouth! And the two single ladies in our group made sure to let him know they thought he was hot. ;)

Although I'm sure meth is the reason he is toothless....

Anyway, the ladies were ordering appetizers, and Linda couldn't decide what she wanted. So she asked Roberto (I'm thinking that was the waiters name, but I could just be making that up) to bring her his favorite appetizer.

So he does...

And this is the, "What the hell did you just bring me?" look.

Yep, it's raw meat. Linda didn't look to thrilled. But, surprisingly, Josh wanted to try it. As did Mal. So then Linda started to eat it. I honestly can't believe Josh ate it. He used to be the kid that ate nothing but tv dinners and cold canned spagghetios. He's come a long way in the past seven years that we've been together. Not only did he eat it, but he really liked it.

Of course, then the waiter came back to see how everyone liked the dish. Then he reveals that it was raw veal.

So, not just raw meat, but raw baby meat. Grrreat.

But at this point, I don't care. I just want my pizza. (although, I'm not the one that has to live with the fact that I just ate raw baby, since I don't eat meat. But, Josh does. And, he's always said he wouldn't eat babies. See what happens when you are a meat eater, Josh? You could be eating babies & not even know it.)

And, my pizza was gooood. The crust was really good. Too bad I can't remember the name of the place, to share it with all of you. Some blogger I am, eh?

After dinner, we get a cab back to the hotel. Of course, actually getting to our room was a huge hassle. It was the four of us, a luggage cart, and two Dutch women trying to get upstairs. In a broken elevator. And there was nobody around to help us. Everyone else thought it was hilarious, except for me, who really has to pee at this point. Also, I'm terrified of getting trapped in an elevator. :/

I'm about to walk up 9 flights of stairs to the room, when finally the other elevator appears. Yay for getting to our hotel room!

It's about 10pm at this point, I think. We were going to go to the casino that was across from the hotel. But, we opened up some wine, and got to talking. Then, time just slipped away from us. Before we knew it, it was 1am, and we were all just ready to crash.

I love this photo of me. It looks like I have a hangover from Hell, but I SWEAR, i was perfectly fine. The pepto is on the table, because I always bring a pharmacy with me whenever I go on a trip. I had taken it out of my bag to make room, and never put it back. It just looks like a hilarious "morning after" shot.

We packed up fairly early (well, 9ish. Poor Linda had been up since 6, waiting on us 3 to wake up), and headed back to Oechsle to pick the up the wine.

I swear we almost bent the axle. ;)

And, on the way back it started raining. Of course.

It was a fun trip, and I'm glad we did it. I don't think I really need to return to Oechsle. However, I did find a place in Bernkastel-Kues that charges €15 euro to try 150 wines. I think that'll be next on our list. ;)

Bad Dürkheimer Wein-Nächte

A few weeks ago, we went on another nighttime wine walk, this time in Bad Dürkheim. And, I forgot to blog about it. Mainly because I tried to block it out of my mind. It wasn't a BAD wine walk. We just all had way too much. Waaaayyy tooo much.

Bad Dürkheim is a spa town, about an hour from us. There was a big group of us, so we had to take two cars.

Now, Josh did bring his fancy camera with him....but he brought the wrong lens...and for some reason, brought his flash. Sometimes I wonder about him. So we didn't get very good photos.

For this wine walk, we paid €17(ish) to get in, but that included a glass, and 15 tickets for wine tastings. This area was much bigger than the Freinsheim walk, and more hilly. We were guessing that this one was at least two miles long. Throughout the vineyards, there were 13 wine tents set up, along with some food tents. At each wine tent, there were at least 5 different wines you could try (typically a mix of white & red, sweet, half-sweet, and dry).

The BEST part about this wine walk was the lights. There was a huge beacon of light pointing to the sky, in the middle of the vineyard. Plus, there were a bunch of trees & a few buildings lit up with spotlights that would slowly change colors. One large building at the far end of the vineyard had green laser beams shooting out of it, across the vineyard and over the town.

Unfortunately we ended up going backwards around the vineyard loop, so for half the walk, the lasers kept threatening to blind us.

Here are some of Josh's (not so good) photos. Doesn't really do the place justice.

Looking out over Bad Dürkheim.

See? Pics not so great. Oh well.

I think the reason the wine hit me so hard is that these places aren't the most vegetarian-friendly. I ate a pretzel. I didn't have as much wine as the guys, but they all had stew, sausages, meat sandwiches, etc. I ate a pretzel. I could have had a crepe, but that was 2/3 of the way in, and I had just walked up a big hill, and the line was really long and slow moving, so I chose to sit instead of eat a crepe.

We have our very own Rainbow Coalition in Germany.

The lights that tried to burn our retinas all night.

As we're coming around to the last quarter of the wine walk, a lady hands us a bunch of tickets that she wasn't going to use.

Then, the guys get the bright idea to buy bottles with the tickets, instead of just tastes. I can't remember if it took 5 or 10 tickets to buy a bottle. But I do know that they bought at least 2 to share between four of us.

I think.

We finally made it back to the car (although I was really slow because of my stupid ankle, and I got slightly left behind), and the ride home was quick. I think.

The next morning, after sleeping til at least 11am, we felt fine. Just couldn't quite piece together the last hour of the night.....
It could have been worse, though. Some friends of ours that were on the walk with us had to be at the Frankfurt airport the next day at the crack of dawn. That wasn't the best morning for them.

And that's the last time I do a 15-wine wine tasting with nothing but a pretzel in my stomach.

Although, stay tuned for a post in about 2 weeks. We're going to a wine bar in Trier that has 150 wines (pour your own glass) that you can try for €15.

I'm not really looking forward to that one, to be quite honest...