Nicky's birthday!!! Turned 30!
Drove car to airport to drop it off. Got information in airport for trip to Mondello Beach recommended by Andrea. Took Reg/train to Isola Delle Femmine.
Stopped at xxx to get brunch. Kathi got a Tonno, Olive, cipolla, and Pomodoro. Chris ordered salame, bufala, pomodoro, rucola. And a cafe latte. The sandwich was incredible.
Then we walked through town and to the beach. Long walk in the sand, then across the highway to a little restaurant/bar where we got aquafrissante con limone and sat outside on a comfortable couch. Very nice rest.
Then walked to the train station to catch a train to Mondello beach. Train tickets were a mess. The machine didn’t work. Tap-on-tap-off worked for Chris’s card but not for Kathi’s phone. We got on the train anyway and the conductor took each card and entered something into his tablet. Google maps reset and we lost understanding of which stop to get off at and ended up getting off at xxx instead of yyy. Chris tapped out and at the end of the day, was charged euro 6.80 for the two-stop local ride --- too expensive. Did we get charged the daily maximum?
Then we got an uber/taxi to the beach. Uber said €21.40 to €32.00. It was €32 for a 3 mile ride, so count on the max price when using an Uber to hail a taxi in Malta!
Then we did a really nice, very long walk up and down the length of the beach. Lots of people playing volley ball. Not so many swimming as it was a little windy and cool. But we did watch kids diving/jumping off the breakwater for a while.
At the end of the walk back was a castle-like building/hotel built over the water, just about 2 meters up with a 1 meter space below. Mediterranean waves are small.
Then we caught the 806 bus back to Palermo downtown about 1 mile from our house. We tried to pay on the bus, but the ticket taking machine on the bus was broken, so the ride was free.
Cleaned up then went out to walk Via Maqueda with the Saturday
night crowd. Kathi found a Sicilian restaurant where we ordered the
fish set menu and had lots of interesting apetizers (anchovy toast,
fish balls, … kathi fill in here). Desert was canaloni cream
filled crispy rolls. We left very full. We walked back on via Roma
to the house.