Day One in Sicily - The Necropolis, Santa Lucia, and Kindess

I'm now in Sicily! I've been enjoying the fresh air and the landscape so much! Here are a few pictures of my first day...

Pantalica is a necropolis near Sortino. People would bury their dead in small cutouts of the rock during the 13th and 10th century BC. The rectangular openings lead all the way down the valley.  

This pool was really cool! The water was such a pretty blue.

Kitty! He followed us around for a bit so we gave him some cheese. 

A chocolate nativity. Just what I wanted for Christmas.

These rusty tools are actually made out of chocolate! What?!

The Christmas lights are everywhere now! 

So on our first night there was a special event for Santa Lucia. The heavy silver sculpture had been gone to the cathedral for a week and on its return, hundreds of people came to the main church to welcome her back. Here you can see her being carried in.

The people in the green hats were in charge of carrying her in.

The people in Sicily are maybe the nicest people I've ever met. When we got lost in Sortino, a man jumped in our car to lead us into the main town center. He walked with us to three different restaurants before we found an open one.  

Today it was raining really hard and we sort of got stuck at an archeological site (more on that later). One taxi driver was busy with customers, but after dropping them off he returned to pick us up. Then he helped us find a lunch place by personally getting out of his car and checking with the owners to see if there was space. 

Everyone has been so lovely! It's been great!