12-1-23 Travel Gods wave magic wands

 To Cefalù!!!   You have no idea how relieved I am to be here in Cefalù, a sweet town on the beach, in my comfortable apartment!  I could still be on a bus to Palermo where I would have to back track an hour to here. It’s 5:00 PM now. 

How many pictures of Etna do I need. A lot!

Wonderful little hike down to the train station. The train to Messina was right on time taking only an hour to get there.  

This was my little beach yesterday, captured on the outward train. 

I had an hour layover in Messina, where I decided to take a short walk to the Duomo.

It was a pretty good Duomo 

I was sort of in a rush because I didn’t want to miss my connection to Cefalù.

A Main Street in Messina. 

Now the story begins. I will try to make it short.

Train strike. My 10:48 train cancelled . No train going to Cefalù from Messina.

The only option I knew was to get a bus to Palermo at 2:00 PM, a two hour ride, (after a 3 hour wait) then back to Cefalù another hour, not including connection times. Shit, fuck shit fuck!  Did I say FUCK yet. 

So I got in line with the 30 other people who were similarly stranded to buy that ticket to Palermo. Bought the ticket as insurance, and got on my phone to find alternative routes. 

Not much was there. But beautiful lovely Google Maps suggested that there was a bus to a town, Santo Stefano di Comastra, which was only 15 miles from Cefalù.  I asked every bus driver at the train station where that bus was.  There were many misleading answers , but one guy said to me in Italian, go down that street 200 meters there is your bus.

Here is the other weird thing. He is speaking in Italian, I don’t understand everything, but enough to know exactly what he means. 

So I go down the street, find a bus. I tell them I’m looking for a bus to Santo Stefano, and they basically say:  yup we are going there right now, want to go? So I board, pay the € 10.30 fare and we are off.

Well I didn’t know what was going to happen when I got to Santo Stefano. The bus drivers said no taxis there. I tried contacting taxi services online but there was no luck there. We stopped at a town 12 miles away where the bus picked up students after school. We spent about 20 minutes waiting, picked up cool looking Italian students, then I had to board another bus. Then finally at 2:15 I arrived at Santo Stefano and I told my driver I’m looking for a ride to Cefalù, in Italian people. Stress brings out the best in language acquisition.  He said, go to the train station.  So I did. Miraculously, like the golden hand of all travel karma that ever was, despite all doubts to the contrary, because, after all, I’m on the same train line that I was originally going to travel on, a train did arrive and ushered me to my new place before nightfall.

PS. There is the best supermarket here I’ve seen on the entire trip. Thank you travel gods- or aren’t I determined.  

Santo Stefano train station.  There was a 500 step stairway that led there from the town center 

Oh, another church. 

Cefalù alleys

The beach. 

There is a castle up there I know it. 

So my day could have turned out miserably. But it didn’t .  I feel so lucky or smart. Or both. Can’t explain this day at all. I just feel so blessed but not in a religious way. I feel blessed that I’m smart enough to figure this shit out.  

Thanks for following along!

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