Saturday, August 22, 2009

Sicily Part 2...Can Life Get Any Better? :)

Sicily was packed full of swimming, fishing, eating, sleeping, dancing and listening (only three people around me spoke any English, so much of the time I was listening to Italian haha).(The one squid I actually caught!!)
The first night we were in Sicily Giusseppe, his Dad and I went squid fishing about seven miles offshore. The weather was beautiful with a slight warm breeze and one-foot waves. We were fishing in about 1,000 meters of water. The process involves dropping a thin cable down about 600 meters. This main cable has a has a light attached at the end that is also wrapped in beef. Slowly this gets brought to the surface and as it does the squid follow the blinking light. Each of us has a thin cable which we held in our hands and reeled in. Our cable had a big hook on the end with some beef and a light as well. We would drop our lines about 100 meters and slowly reel them in jigging them around on the way up. Long story short, Giusseppe (the Sicilian fishing champion four years in a row) caught 15, his dad caught six and I caught one at the very end of the night. I was a bit annoyed. What was I doing wrong? I was doing exactly what they told me to do... After a while Giusseppe made me switch lines with him so he could prove to me that nothing was wrong with my line. Within five minutes he caught a squid...Argh:( It was a great time either way.(Little stinker...when I was cleaning this one it's huge eyeball popped black juice all over my shorts haha)
(Within two hours of catching the squid it was on our plate...doesn't get much more fresh than that...mmmm it was sooo good too)
The days were spent cruising to different beaches and coves on the coast of Sicily and the Islands which are about 13 miles off its coast. The islands were truly remarkable. This was definitely the clearest most blue water I have ever been in and I was relishing every minute of it. There was one point when we were cruising from one island to another that I said to myself, "It's official, I will be having a sick boat on the Mediterranean absolutely asap!" As some of you know one of my dreams is to have a boat and cruise around the world...the Med. will surely be one of my first stops!(Delicious Occhiata)
Cliff jumping was a very common activity and I jumped everywhere that looked feasible. I always checked to make sure it was deep enough before climbing the rock faces and plunging into the perfect water...but Wow was it fun! Nothing was too high (probably seven or eight meters at the most) but I had a blast.

5 comments:

Christina said...

Saluti Garrett,

great pictures to look at....Italy is the country if we talk food. Sometimes I think I'm born in the wrong country. You must be speaking Italian quite fluid by now ;)
I hope you'll share al those recipes you made!

arrivederci,

Christina

Kait W. said...

From the pics of you fishing you look like an Italian yourself in your black speedo and fedora hahaha I'm sure that squid is very sorry for getting ink on your shorts LOL Does squid ink even come out of clothes, or do u have a permanent black spot on your shorts? If it stains, now everytime you wear those shorts you'll remember all the fun you had in Italy. haha
Keep on havin fun, can't wait to hear about your horseback riding adventure!
-Kait

Garrett said...

I wish I were speaking Italian fluid...I'm not... I need to read a book and study it to learn it. I can't learn by listening.

Yes the ink came out haha.

EricT said...

looks like fun! I love squid

EricT said...

Also Kait W., I believe the hat is called a Trilby, slightly different than a Fedora.

Trilby = Justin Timberlake
Fedora = Indiana Jones


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