JD and I set off earlyish to take the washing to the laundry place, telling the boys we'd be back in half an hour or so, and would then head out to do something.
Except the laundry place turned out to be a dry cleaners, and our massive bag of washing (8kg or so) would have cost a helluva lot to get cleaned. On talking to the proprietor, he offered to do it for 50 euro (AUD75), which would be a loss for him, but a lot for us. While we appreciated his generous offer, we hoped to find a laundromat.
Back at the house, our internet searches revealed that there were only a handful of laundromats as we know them in Sicily, the nearest ones in Palermo. I spoke with our host, but after working through several options, and me getting absurdly wound up (and freaking her our with my tears of frustration), JD ended up handwashing a fair bit of it, and Marida, our host, offered to use her washing machine for the jeans and my (still unbelievably stinky) fleece jacket.
At least one of my frustrations was that if I knew we'd be handwashing, we could have bloody done that yesterday when we were sitting around doing not much, instead of losing another day to doing not much. At least the mega-sized travel plug, and quarter bar of Sard laundry soap got used!
After lunch, we went up to the local ruins of Solunto. We had been told it was walking distance, but after the last few days efforts with the rain, we decided not to risk it, and drove up, with the brollies in the car. In the end we probably should have used them, as parasols - it was quite hot up on the top of the hill.
[Lots of pictures, and some more info, to come]
On the way back down the hill, we went into town to pick up some more groceries (speck or similar for cabonara, more wine, few other items), but discovered the route blocked - some kind of festival or other going on. We found a park a block above the supermarket and walked down to discover the supermarket closed up tight even though it had only just turned 5pm. We moved the car, and this time left the hot and tired kids in the car while we went to find the little convenience store we'd spotted on our first night. Turns out the festival was some kind of major local religious event, with every shop shut, and people either lining the street, or waiting in groups with a big banner and some kind of uniform, as the parade slowly progressed up the main drag, collecting the waiting groups as it went.
No shopping was happening in Porticello today, so we headed back and made bolognaise out of whatever we had left over. It wasn't bad, but it was a little lacking, and particularly lacking wine. Ah well, a sober day wasn't going to kill us.
Except the laundry place turned out to be a dry cleaners, and our massive bag of washing (8kg or so) would have cost a helluva lot to get cleaned. On talking to the proprietor, he offered to do it for 50 euro (AUD75), which would be a loss for him, but a lot for us. While we appreciated his generous offer, we hoped to find a laundromat.
Back at the house, our internet searches revealed that there were only a handful of laundromats as we know them in Sicily, the nearest ones in Palermo. I spoke with our host, but after working through several options, and me getting absurdly wound up (and freaking her our with my tears of frustration), JD ended up handwashing a fair bit of it, and Marida, our host, offered to use her washing machine for the jeans and my (still unbelievably stinky) fleece jacket.
At least one of my frustrations was that if I knew we'd be handwashing, we could have bloody done that yesterday when we were sitting around doing not much, instead of losing another day to doing not much. At least the mega-sized travel plug, and quarter bar of Sard laundry soap got used!
After lunch, we went up to the local ruins of Solunto. We had been told it was walking distance, but after the last few days efforts with the rain, we decided not to risk it, and drove up, with the brollies in the car. In the end we probably should have used them, as parasols - it was quite hot up on the top of the hill.
[Lots of pictures, and some more info, to come]
On the way back down the hill, we went into town to pick up some more groceries (speck or similar for cabonara, more wine, few other items), but discovered the route blocked - some kind of festival or other going on. We found a park a block above the supermarket and walked down to discover the supermarket closed up tight even though it had only just turned 5pm. We moved the car, and this time left the hot and tired kids in the car while we went to find the little convenience store we'd spotted on our first night. Turns out the festival was some kind of major local religious event, with every shop shut, and people either lining the street, or waiting in groups with a big banner and some kind of uniform, as the parade slowly progressed up the main drag, collecting the waiting groups as it went.
No shopping was happening in Porticello today, so we headed back and made bolognaise out of whatever we had left over. It wasn't bad, but it was a little lacking, and particularly lacking wine. Ah well, a sober day wasn't going to kill us.
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