Lotsa Bologna: La Isola di Ustica

Ciao from Ustica!!

Day five of my trip, and still no luggage...but, I will go from Mazara to the Palermo airport tomorrow morning to see if it in fact arrived on an Alitalia flight from Rome. This is the last information I was given, but I'll have to investigate in person.

On the brighter side (and it really is bright and sunny here), we have spent three great days on the island of Ustica.

Upon arriving, it was a quick panino near the port, then a 20 minute very bumpy van ride along the windy roads of the island until reaching our destination, a hotel with a group of bungalows perched high on top of the hill in the area called Spalmatore.

Here is a pic of the view from the front door of our bungalow, then one of the pool, overlooking the Mediterranean.

After dropping off our bags, it was time to explore, and we headed down a series of stairways until reaching the main road. We were in search of the saltwater pools that had been naturally carved into rocks.

Here are a couple of pics of the first pool, one from on top of the hill, and one close up with me and Francesco before diving in.

As you might imagine, the water of the Mediterranean was warm and also very salty. Check out this pic of the salt that formed in a shallow puddle that dried up. Looked like it would be great for a scrub...and it was!

Our next stop was a different pool, that also had a small cafe where we stopped to cool off and have a strawberry lemon granita with brioche - a Sicilian summer treat!