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20 Days in Italy: Part I - Sicily

By Joey Pasco

The scent of jasmine floated on the early evening air as we exited the train station, the sun’s golden light reflecting off the face of a nearby cliff. Only a few blocks’ walk to go.

But let’s back up.

Nine hours earlier…

It was roughly 11AM local time and we were exhausted. Sitting in the Milan airport (in “the shitty terminal”), our internal clocks told us it was 5AM, and we’d been awake for nearly 24 hours. The realization that we still had several hours to go on our journey only added to the feeling of fatigue.

My wife Christina and I had left the house the previous morning. In the end, it took a car, a train, a plane, another plane, a taxi, and another train to get from Baltimore to Cefalù.

And then we were there. And it was all worth it.

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Cefalù is a town located on the northern coast of Sicily, about an hour’s ride east from Palermo. It’s quite a popular tourist destination in the summer, but in April it was pleasantly uncrowded.

When we arrived at our B&B (called Lirma), we were greeted by our host, Giuseppe, and immediately offered limoncello, which was homemade by his mother-in-law. This was just a small taste of the hospitality we would encounter over the next few weeks. Afterwards, we crashed for nearly 12 hours and woke feeling rested and entirely free of jet lag. I suppose that’s the upside of staying awake for 36 hours; if you time it right, you can end up on local time after only one night.

After an amazing breakfast spread made up mostly of locally-sourced ingredients, we set out on foot to explore the town. It’s not a very large area, so it didn’t take long for us to familiarize ourselves with the map.

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We had lunch—pranzo—at a great little restaurant called Ristorante Ti Vitti, and then spent some time just sitting on the beach. Before the sun began to set, we visited the medieval wash house that was once used by Christina’s ancestors (as recently as her great-grandmother), and then strolled the town as the light changed to dusk.

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On our second day, we woke up for the sunrise and wandered the empty streets of still-sleeping Cefalù. Then it was back to the B&B for that incredible breakfast.

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In the afternoon, we were picked up by two of my wife’s Sicilian cousins, Agostino and his youngest daughter, Stefania. Back in 2002, while researching her roots, Christina discovered she had relatives living in Termini Imerese, a town located about halfway between Palermo and Cefalù. She’d met them twice in the years since, but this was my first time meeting them.

With us speaking very little Italian, and their knowledge of English being limited, conversation in the car was somewhat stunted. The ice was broken when Stefania and I simultaneously revealed that we were both using translation apps on our phones in order to communicate, and after getting a good laugh out of that, things went much more smoothly. Agostino brought us to a small square that still bears his family name (and that of Christina’s grandmother), and then to an elevated area overlooking the neighboring area and coastline.

At their home we were welcomed by the rest of the family, and we had an amazing dinner. The food was so delicious, I wish I had an extra stomach! Even better than the food—if that’s even possible—was the experience of meeting these wonderful people and having them open their home to us.

(To Agostino, Anna, Stefania, Elisabetta, Rita, Gino, Maria-Luisa, Rosella, Fabio, and Daniele: Thank you! Again!)

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Agostino, Christina, me, Fabio, and Elisabetta. (First time using the self-timer on the Nikon FE.)

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In the evening, Agostino, his wife Anna, and sister-in-law Rita took us to see historic Palermo.

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Our final day in Cefalù consisted of further meanderings (including a hidden path that lead behind the cathedral) and a delectable lunch at La Trinacria where we sat outside overlooking the water.

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Agostino graciously offered to give us a ride from Cefalù to the Port of Palermo, where we’d be catching the ferry. That evening, as we said goodbye to the family and to Sicily, we were sent off with a Mediterranean sunset, already missing the cerulean blue waters of Cefalù.

Next stop: Roma.

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Footnotes

April 2016 | Nikon FE + Nikkor 28mm f/2.8 | Hasselblad 500CM + Zeiss 80mm f/2.8 C T* | Kodak Portra 160 & 400 Film Stocks

FootNotes

April 2016 | Nikon FE + Nikkor 28mm f/2.8 | Hasselblad 500CM + Zeiss 80mm f/2.8 C T* | Kodak Portra 160 & 400 Film Stocks

© 2026 Joey Pasco

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