Caltagirone: a short stay this Summer

Heading to Caltagirone this summer my travelling companion and I stopped in the small town of Piedimonte Etneo on the lower slopes of Mt Etna, bought some local cherries and later that afternoon checked into a small B&B in Caltagirone for a night.

The balcony of the room sat on the edge of the town's splendid staircase, La Scalazza which is made up of 142 majolica tiled steps, and leads to the church of Santa Maria del Monte. And the view from the windows of our ‘room on the steps’ overlooked the tiles of Caltagirone’s roofs and majolica Baroque belltowers.

The washed Etna cherries were sweet.

Caltagirone, a pale stone town famous for its production of ornate and colourful ceramics was rebuilt after the devastating 1693 earthquake which rocked Sicily’s south east.

It has all the feel of a bustling, big town of the Sicilian interior decorated with majolica and is 4o or so kilometres from the sea.

A snapshot of Caltagirone this summer

Young voices resounded on the steps of La Scalazza; pot plants, in the shape of a giant treble clef, laid out on the steps celebrated a local music festival; almond granita was refreshing with cold coffee and bread in a courtyard in Via Bongiovanni;

Belltowers, almost hidden, were seen across the steps from our room; an aperitivo was enjoyed in a bar opposite Giacomo Alessi's ceramic shop (Signor Alessi, one of Caltagirone's well known ceramic artists has to be named after the town's patron saint, Giacomo).

A cool drink, at Bar Loggia in Piazza del Municipio, served by a young waiter in bright red sneakers; a young English tourist at the next table read Daphne Phelps much loved book, ‘A House in Sicily’; evening breezes drifted; and people gathered in Piazza del Muncipio;

We wandered ceramic shops and watched artists at work; enjoyed the lights of distant towns in the valley (Val di Noto); meandered streets lined with splendid Baroque and some Art Nouveau style buildings; heard the sound of the 9pm bells from an open window and discovered the town’s peaceful and shade filled public gardens.