Still in Sicily, on day three of our trip, we left our AirBnB in Giarre to head across the island to the west coast.  We drove through the middle of the island to get there, and it was sooooo beautiful.  It reminded us of Montana, with hills and mountains and meadows and hardly any people.  We loved it.  About 3 hours later, we got to the big city of Palermo.  Because Sicily has a history of being conquered by many different lands, Palermo is a confluence of a variety of cultures.  We saw many different kinds and colors of people there, which was such a relief!  We often feel we are sooooo different from everyone else here in Naples, so it felt really nice to be one of many different kinds of people in Palermo.

First we visited Ballaro Market, which felt to us like an epic, authentic version of what Pike Place Market is going for… it was booth after booth of meat, fish, veggies, clothes, and trinkets.  I have to admit, I held onto my purse rather tightly here, as it felt a bit sketchy!  Here is a poem I found about it:

Of all the street markets, Ballarò is the largest, the oldest and funniest of all. It stands up against any sort of social evolution or modern hygiene standards. Once inside you’ll feel as if you’ve just entered a noisy medieval marketplace. Here you’ll find the most picturesque, colorful, and yes, unhygienic and loud markets in existence anywhere.  Inside the Ballarò Market, you’ll find everything you can imagine. This market features not only vegetables and fruits, as well as the obligatory stinky fish and meat but also includes every sort of odds and ends. Something of a flea market. And in flea markets, you never know what you may find. One important caveat, however: When I say close your eyes, I’m just saying it as figure of speech. Actually, you should keep your eyes wide open and be constantly on guard against the loss of your camera or wallet. Ballarò seems to be a training camp for tomorrow’s professional criminals.

After the market, we found plazas and statues and historic buildings, as well as a walking downtown with food, booths of crafts people selling handmade things, stores full of African and Middle Eastern garb, and cool art everywhere.  We fell in love with Palermo (for the few hours we were there, anyway)!