Where's Shirley now?

Ahh the best travel partner is: My mum....we had the best time!
My mum came over for a visit with me on September 1st for a 2 month stay. During this time she would enjoy my French life and we would do a little bit of travelling together.
We spent the first few weeks around my cottage and she would be one of my first guests to stay in my newly finished apartment. It was cosy and self contained and she loved it.
We would spend time with my wonderful partner Alain and my friends in my closest town, take in a medieval dinner and of course oour afternoon aperitifs. Mum always had her video with her and we have managed to closk up many hours of our memories which I cherish.

Mid September we would fly to Catania after spending a couple of days in Paris. We visited some of the places aound St Paul and the Jewish quarter, after seeing the movie Sarah's Key we were quite fascinated by it all. A lunch on the Seine, delicious, afternoon tea in Montmarte then off to Sicily.
We had rented a car for the 16 day duration so set off for Syracusa, yes back to the place I was dumped at in my earlier blogs. This time however, I knew some of the best places to go and stay so we did.
We travelled to the centre of Sicily to Piazza Almerina, then down to Sciacca. Back to the apartmento on the port to Michel the old man who loved me!
Not having kept him on my contact list, we turned up unexpectantly and he almost had a heart attack and the old love pangs for me apparantly arose again as he tried to embrace me as I yelled to my mother to "come and meet Michel". We had a seriously good laugh at the time as he showed us to my original apartmento, not at all prepared for our overnight stay.

We spent the next morning with him and his wife, me scurrying away as he tried to embrace me at any opportunity, my mum chuckling in the background and at my request, "dont let me out of your sight".

We had a lovely lunch and then headed of to Caltabalotta, the village high up in the mountains. I had been there before (also in my blog July 10) but so wanted my mum to experience such a place. We wandered around the village, talking to the locals, videoing the locals and really enjoyed it.
We took off in the afternoon for Salemi, unfortunatley not in the right direction exactly we ended up in Palermo (all roads seem to lead to Palermo!) and arrived and greeted by David and Nikola my friends from last year.

We were to stay in Davids renovated apartment, it was fabulous, in the centre of this medieval town with tiny streets just 2.5mtrs wide. Now this was a problem as when I booked the rental car I requested a small car for a reason...however they conveniently upgraded me to a larger small car that only barely fitted in these tiny Sicilian streets if you stopped at the tight corners and turned the wheels. All but once did we make it, oooh it was just a tiny scratch on the mirror wasn't it?

So from Salemi we explored the west coast of Sicily. Marsala, Mozia, Trapeni, Castellemare Del Golfo and of course the Couscous Festival in San Vito De Copo.

We had some wonderful dinners and drinks with the hospitality of Nikola and David.

While staying in the apartment it was also difficult to park as most nights there were but 6 spaces close to the apartment. So one night I thought it fine to park in the police parking space..... just overnight! Next morning I was on the internet to my sister showing her on Skype te wonderful 180 degree view over the incredible village from our balcony, and a man in uniform was below. Fearing it was the parking inspector I bonjournoed, and gestured to my car that I can move it. In his less than perfect English he said it was fine and I went back inside to resume the conversation. Next minute a knock .... well more of a bang than a knock, the very same man in full uniform was standing at my door. Not knowing what to say I said "entree, entree" so in he came. After all its mafia country and who would not let someone like that in?
He proceeded to sit on the sofa and chat away to my sister non stop for almost 10 mins without any of us being able to get a word in. We said we would call her back and we had his company for at least another 10 before we ushered him out courteously of course as we were heading off to Corleone (head of Mafia country) for lunch. Yes we did have friends in high places .... just in case.
We spent the day in Corleone at the Anti Mafia Museum and returned tired and lost again ...... via Palermo .... again to Salemi to pack up for the rest of our Sicilian stay on the East coast back in Roccalumera at Danillo's family house.

It was Grand Final day on the Saturday and the Pies were playing so most important on the Friday was to find a hot spot for the wifi....not easy along this coastline of scattered villages. But we did so Saturday morning up at 5am and heading off down to the beach road outside the Giant Prawn we sat and watched the first half of our team play. Excited and anxious as the battery on our laptops were wavering we headed into the now open cafe and plugged in, coffeed up and managed to watch the last half in comfort, though terribly dissapointed about the result. Lets not talk football! ..... next year!

We then packed up and made our way to Messina for our ferry crossing to the mainland Italy and eventually to Gerocarne in Calabria. Herewe were to stay with family of my mums friends Stephano and Grazia. It was a small hillside village of perhaps just a few hundred people, a town square lined with old buildings, war memorials and a little street bar. Around the edges were dotted white plastic chairs and tables. As the afternoon progressed and my mum and I sat in the square men arrived to play cards, chat or just sit and watch the world go by. We decided to have our usual aperitif of wine, yet the bar only had champagne, huh? what no wine in Italy? ... we sat on our white plastic seat like the men and only the men, not a woman in site and we obviously became the talk of the town! A man came over for a short chat and then announced to the locals that we were staying at Stephano's house. Whispers went around, nods and looks which kept mum and I amused as we watched the goings on of Gerocarne. We had a lovely night with the family, Pizzas all round ... of course ... no ....large, large square pizzas.....more than I could eat in a lifetime for me!

Next day, sick on pizzas and too many tomatoes we headed towards the Amalfi Coast, spent the night in a little b&b just south of Amalfi, next day arriving at our Hotel Bacco to relax and visit Amalfi, Isle of Capri and spend some time on the beach at Priano. It was fabulous, love the coastline of Amalfi.

After 4 days there of eating drinking and enjoying the sun, we headed to Naples and back to Fontenay in France. We still had a couple of weeks for mum to enjoy my French Life before we set off back to Australia for 6 weeks and my son Benjamin's wedding.

Alain was heading to work in the Netherlands so we hitched a ride and spent 2 days in Bruges and a day in Amsterdam. We met up with him again for the trip back and it was a great opportunity for mum to see these places, cold as it was we took heaps more videos.

 Time had passed and it was now time sadly for my mum to go back to Australia, me to go for 6 weeks. Alain organised a wonderful farewell dinner with our friends to say goodbye. A great night was had by all and will live long in my memory of good times we have spent together.

As we were about to leave for Paris a Qantas plane strike was called so our fear of not getting back at all was pending. We managed to get to Singapore with our Air France flights but the next leg was going to be a probem. In Singapore we waited for confirmation of our flight only to be told at the last minute that I could get on but my mum was not. Our choice was to wait for a flight or they could put us up in a hotel in Singapore until they could arrange a flight. Of course we chose choice no#2 thinking we would end up in some dingy hotel but "thankyou Qantas" we were put up in the 5* Mandarin Orchard on Orchard road. My first visit to Singapore, it was a treat with all expenses paid including dinners, lunch at SD$231 and a fabuloous room to boot. Alas it was just for 24 hours and we were back on the plane to Melbourne.
We had a wonderful holiday together with lots of memories to share, not to mention the video.
 Thankyou again mum you are the best xxxMaz