2025 March 29,30: Catania

Weekend in town. We’re keeping up our 5+ miles/day walking pace.

We went into an immense church on the Piazza Dante (btw Catania wins the award for highest % territory occupied by churches, hands down). What it is, is confusing: Apple map calls it the Benedictine Monastary of San Nicolò, but that website has pictures that don’t match what we saw. Here’s what we saw. One interesting thins was the linear sundial:

Here’s the Piazza del Duomo, probably the heart of the city:

Corner of Via Pacini and Via Santa Filomena:

A car repair shop unlike most in our neighborhood. This one’s at Via Francesco Cristi and Via Conte Di Torino. Zoom in, the details are pretty impressive:

Wine bar Razmataz. We didn’t stop; just a nice picture:

Forget where this is, don’t feel like looking it up:

There is a major pedestrian thoroughfare through the center of town: Via Etnea. At one end is the entrance to Giardino Bellini, a large, beautiful park; our favorite Pasticceria, Savia; and seemingly the starting point for civic activities. We saw a gay pride parade and a Palestinian protest march while we were there:

One block to the east is a section with a lot of restaurants:

We had two disappointments over the weekend. The first was that we planned to see a Tango Concert in the beautiful Teatro Massimo Bellini, but when we got there it was sold out:

The other is we got an IRS notice CP5071 in the mail, forwarded from Hernandez to Sacramento. In the roughly 3 hours we spent online, on hold and on the phone with them, we learned that someone had filed a fraudulent tax return using Leslie’s name & SSN. Her ID has been stolen. Along with the news that Hernandez needs a new roof (10s of 000s of $) and that the tenant is breaking the lease and moving out, some anxious moments.

One good thing: got to see Mt Etna from town, first time it’s been clear of clouds: