We're awake really early this morning. The waves are lapping and the birds are sounding the dawn chorus. We tidy up, Ali goes to pay and is surprised when the owners gives us discount because he noticed Nick's wheelchair on the back.
At the little supermarket up the hill we stop for a few things and the clerk tries to short change Ali by €20. What a difference.
The journey down the motorway goes well and we pull into the ferry terminal at Villa San Giovanni and buy our open-return ticket €98. The queues are long as we watch one ferry load and then another come alongside. This should be ours but after a few movements everything stops. The ferry on the next berth has broken down and everything is backing off and driving onto ours. Eventually we board, over two hours after arriving.
The crossing is less than twenty minutes, the ramp drops and the Italians do everything they can to avoid disembarking in orderly files. Out of the port we reach a big, busy intersection. Traffic is semi controlled by two policewomen whistling and waving, but motorists help by tooting when the traffic lights change.
Soon we are out of Messina on the coastal road. The sea is jade and torquoise with little harbours and towns much tidier than the mainland. A few miles on it's more rural and we pass laybys full of rubbish bags and upturned bins. It's not all bad, there are lots of wild flowers and shrubs and little allotments.
We turn our thoughts to our stop for tonight. With the ferry hold-ups the camperstop we'd outlined is too far away but Ali finds a Fattore Amico restaurant and rings to make sure it's OK. The owner speaks a little English and suggests we use the motorway as it will take over an hour longer on the back roads. On the motorway we can see a lot of volcanic hills, many creased and fissured from former lava flows. It reminds us of Iceland except it's 22 degrees. At the end of the A20 the toll station is broken and everyone goes through free.
We drive through Patti and take a short detour along the beach road at San Giorgio di Giolosa Marea where a few vans are parked, and consider stopping here, but we've phoned the Fattoria and Ali is set on the restaurant for our first night here.
Following the satnav as we drive, Ali is reading directions in the Fattore Amico book and spots the brown signs it says to follow. We turn in swiftly. Snoopy bongs for a few yards then resets the route and says it's a mile shorter.
The road narrows swiftly and steepens. There is a roadworks sign just after which we meet a Nissan Micra. No room to pass, he reverses. Just beyond his layby on a bank is a mini-digger loading a truck. A few more scoops and the truck moves on up the hill. We squeeze past the digger and the road becomes even more difficult; very steep, hairpins, broken [dug up] tarmac and only as wide as the van. At one point another mini-digger is parked only a few yards off the bend. Nick fears the crunch against the wall as he keeps the power on hard. Thankfully we don't scrape the wall, but if we'd stopped on the loose surface we might not have started again.
After a few more horrible steep turns we see the gate and turn in.
It's a beautiful spot overlooking the valley with mountains beyond. Ali goes to investigate. There are a few people around but no-one queries our arrival or acts like mine host and the restaurant has a steep flight of stone steps. We hang around forty minutes or so, comtemplating our descent, had we used the wrong road? We must have. Cars come straight through the carpark and out the other end. Ali walks to the gate and finds there is a road with a white centre line out there, and we decide to return to the sesaside.
Twenty minutes later we are beside a smooth blue sea, looking out at Sicily's volcanic islands; Vulcano and Lipari, some of the Aeolian islands. Conveniently we have parked right opposite a pizzaria.
Nick goes to play back the impossible drive on the dashcam but is upset to find it didn't record!
Ali's response to the suggestion we do it again is not printable!
Anyway, the pizza was very good - wood fired with asparagus and artichokes.
Let's hope tomorrow is a bit less chaotic.