African Storms 2: Armaggedon!

Ignoring every weather report we could find, we headed out today in search of some Roman Mosaics. As we set off on our hour and a half long journey it was spitting but within half an hour the downpour was torrential - almost comically so.

Everyone talks about the difference in affluence between the north and the south of Italy. We've only been here a few days so the most notable example of this has been the quality of the roads. Not only are they pothole riddled, most major roads clearly haven't been resurfaced in a very long time. There is very little thought put into drainage and many freeways are quite literally so overgrown in parts so that the right hand lane is almost unusable.

As you might imagine then, they didn't handle the roads well and our quick trip up into the hills of the interior became an epic voyage with visibility reduced to tens of meters at times.

When we finally arrived at our lunch destination (Piazza Armerina) we simply stopped at the first restaurant we could find with a parking space directly out front.

We then drove down to Villa Romana del Casale and sat in the car for half an hour waiting for the rains to subside. It was worth it though - despite getting very wet on the walk up, the mosaics were pretty spectacular, although to be honest, for me history only starts getting interesting after the Sack of Rome.

We then idled our way home, dodging the occasional mudslide caused by the rains and managing to keep the car on the road despite the thick layer of clay that had washed across the road.

As we drove in though, the skies had cleared and there was Etna looming on the horizon. Surely things will get better soon.

BTW, you might like to revisit our last two posts for a couple of pics.