To slip down to Cefalu, from the Madonie Mountains, is something I like to do when staying in Polizzi. And, early this summer visits to Cefalu were a nice way to welcome the Sicilian summer and enjoy some quiet rediscoverery of this medieval seaside town.

Mosaic splendour, souvenirs and suntanned tourists

To walk the main street, Corso Ruggero, and the anticipation of seeing Cefalu’s 12^th century Arab Norman cathedral, dazzling in the sun, sitting at the rear of Piazza del Duomo with the huge rocky outcrop, La Rocca, behind; to enter the cathedral's cool silence; to see the mosaic of Christ the Panocrator, ‘the most sublime representation of the redeemer in all Christian art’ (John Julius Norwich).

To linger in Piazza del Duomo; to walk the wide footpath along the lido by the Tyrrhenian Sea decked with souvenirs, straw hats, sarongs and cotton beach shirts; suntanned tourists wandering; and to walk the narrow streets.

Gelato, fishing nets and the Madonna

Cefalu, the first weeks of summer: a peach gelato in a brioche at Bar Duomo; a lunch of seafood risotto and grilled sword fish with a Sicilian white wine from the local winery Abbazia Sant’Anastasia enjoyed along the water’s rocky edge; a postcard written to send back home; the bright colours of the lidos and the beaches not yet packed.

To glimpse colourful nets hanging, a reminder that Cefalu is a fishing town; to be taken once again by one of Sicily’s loveliest mosaics, the gentle eyes, the wisp of dark hair and the elegant curved fingers; to sit in the quiet of the cathedral’s solemn interior; to admire Antonello Gagini’s 16^thcentury Madonna and Child;

An abandoned beauty

And, to walk past the lovely old building, Albergo Barranco (always closed up, with an unfinished modern addition to the back) in Piazza Garibaldi at the end of Corso Ruggero hoping that it will, this time, be open for guests.

Salve

Suzanne