The next morning, Monday, June 22, we were in Trapani. I was pleasantly surprised that with the ship in port and stable and with a breakfast of dry toast and hot tea I was ready to go.
The choices for the day were Segesta with its Greek Doric temple or the medieval hilltop town of Erice (pronounced eritche).
After a bus ride up a mountain on a road with hairpin turns we reached Erice. In my photo above you can see a church from Crusader times, and behind and above it a fort built on the site of a temple of Venus. We had a walking tour in another picturesque medieval town. We passed Maria Grammatico's world famous marzipan (ground almonds and sugar) shop. Many were colored and in the shapes of different fruits. She learned the art of preparing marzipan and other sweet treats in an orphanage run by a convent. The children sold the delicacies to raise money for both institutions. We saw a large tower, built as a watch tower and converted to a church bell tower. We had free time in the town square.
One of the unsolved puzzles of physics involves Sicilian born Ettore Majorana (1906-1938?). He had been working with Enrico Fermi and had knowledge of research to build an atomic weapon. He is known to have boarded a boat from Palermo to Naples. And that is the last time he was seen. Did he commit suicide by jumping off? Did he accidentally fall off? Was he kidnapped? Did he disguise himself to hide? It is a puzzle. We passed this research institute named in his honor.
We returned to the ship in time for lunch. The ship headed back toward Civitavecchia, where we originally boarded. The sirocco was still blowing and the seas were rough so it seemed wise to skip lunch. At 4:00 pm we had a briefing and were given disembarkation instructions. I also skipped the captain's farewell dinner. The next day I asked someone if many people didn't go to the dinner. The answer, about half the people.
