Erice

Kim writing: So we got a little ahead of ourselves because we forgot to write about Erice, which is very close to my uncle's house, before writing about driving to the other side of Sicily.
You have probably guessed that we had email difficulties once we left Sicily. We tried several times in Rome, Pisa, and Germany but to no avail. I am finally going back and writing about each place before we forget what we did!
Ok, Erice. This was our favorite place in Sicily and one of the favorites of the whole trip. Like most old towns, it was built on top of a hill and you can see it from my uncle's house. They didn't bother to flatten out the top of the hill before building on it, so all of the streets are crazy steep! And the cobblestones are worn smooth so it is quite difficult to walk on them without shoes that have lots of traction. The main attraction is a castle from the middle ages that now houses a fancy resort, so we couldn't go in, but we could take lots of pictures from all the way around the outside.
We visited the city two times. Once we went in the late afternoon and had dinner at a wonderful restaurant then walked around in the dark. Dinner was at Hotel Elimeo because my mom went there last year with my aunt and uncle and they absolutely loved the food. It was a little of a splurge, but really worth it. There are pictures of some appetizers we ordered that were just different cheeses with tomatoes. Look here The spots on the one cheese are peppercorns and all of them were delicious, expecially the tomatoes! (I don't even like tomatoes!)
After dinner we went walking to see what we could even though all of the shops were closed. We made it to the main piazza and were going to turn around but all of a sudden realized that Uncle Bruce was taking off in the other direction looking for the castle. We all decided to follow and that is how we got all of the amazing night pictures with the castle and the view. Like this one.
Some of us were so enthralled by the city that we went back the next day. We took a gondola to the top this time and took many pictures of the city of Trapani where we boarded the gondola. In the background you will see three islands, and the one farthest away is Marettimo where we went for a boat ride and swim. Once at the top we enjoyed looking at all the buildings in the daylight and wanted to take a picture of every courtyard and side street! I was especially facinated with the gutters and downspouts on the buildings because they used small pieces of terre cotta and nested them inside each other to direct the water. How inventive! In addition to wandering around town poking in and out of shops and checking out the castle we were awed by the view. You could even see the town where Uncle Bruce lives in this picture. It is off in the distance right on the coast.