Caltagirone to Ragusa (23/9)

Caltagirone's stairs - all tiled.

We headed back into Caltagirone this morning to explore the town before heading south east to Noto. Jill had found a small flyer with a map at last night's hotel, so with that and the guidebook in hand we set off. The town is renown for its Majolica-ware ceramics, and there was evidence of this everywhere. Unfortunately, there is little of it we would buy. It is highly coloured and most of it is just over the top. One thing Caltagirone does do well is the making of ceramic tiles, and there is a monumental staircase which is decorated with them. The riser of the 142 steps was tiled, and each with a different pattern so it was every impressive.

Majolica ware was everywhere

The town itself was largely rebuilt after a very destructive earthquake in 1693. It wasn't rebuilt to a plan, so it is full of narrow alleyways, some of which are only staircases. We are churched out, so we didn't look at any. Instead we walked along to the gardens and then went to the Ceramics Museum. This is housed in what was once the Bonaiuto Natale Theatre, built in the 18th century. It was very well set out, sgiving the history of Sicily's 5000 years of pottery, starting with pottery from prehistoric Sicily right through to the present day. Majolica ware is the ceramic Sicily, and in particular Caltagirone, is famous for. It is a terracotta-based ceramic, so it is not a fine ceramic. The colours are mostly your primary colours and seen en masse it is overwhelming. The painting tends to be in broad brush strokes as well, so everything is bold and in your face. Obviously it has its admirers.

Funerary urn in the ceramics museum

As we left the museum we came upon a New Zealand family we had spoken to briefly yesterday in Aidone. They had wanted to visit the museum but thought it was shut. We assured them it wasn't, and that if they liked ceramics, to go in. We had a chat (nice to speak a bit of English) and then headed back to the car.

We reached Ragusa early in the afternoon, parked the car close to our hotel and went looking for it. It was all locked up, so we decided to go for a wander and come back. Ragusa is really two towns, the old town, Regusa Ibla, is on a promontory with ravines on three sides, and the "newer" Baroque town is up on a plateau. The two towns are connected by a narrow spit of land.
The town has its origins deep in Sicilian history when the original Sicels moved inland to escape from Greek colonists landing on the coast in 728 BC. The newer Baroque city rose out of the destruction of the old town by an earthquake in 1693. The newer town has a rectangular street grid because it was a planned town drawn up to replace that which was destroyed. The churches are the tallest buildings in the Baroque town, with most apartment buildings being three to four storeys. We headed down the hill but decided that we would leave the old town until tomorrow. The cathedral was open so we stuck our heads inside and were pleasantly surprised. Although obviously Baroque on the outside, it was very lightly decorated inside. From there we headed through the retail district and found the museum. It is tucked away underneath the shopping mall and there was absolutely no signage to indicate its existence. They aren't doing themselves any favours, because it was really good and FREE! They had some wonderful finds from all over Sicily, and the only two bronze helmets, one Greek, the other Roman, that we have seen. They also had reconstructed a pottery kiln.

Bronze helmet in Ragusa museum

By the time we had finished wandering the museum we felt it was late enough to try the hotel again. We went back and the landlord appeared from across the street. He came out of "H24 Hotel", and we were staying at "Night and Day". There seemed to be a bit of a theme here. He asked to see our booking confirmation, the first one to do so, and then let us in. Again, a small but clean and neat room. He had reasonable English, but warned us that the lady organising our breakfast had none. We said that we felt that we would be able to make ourselves understood, and he left us.  

After settling in, we set off again to find dinner. Jill opted for a seafood pizza which was very generously topped with octopus, mussels, clams etc. while Allan had a seafood Penne. We were persuaded to have a cassata for dessert, another great meal.