DAY TWENTY-TWO: Sicilian Cycleblaze Meet-Up
Sicily, All Day
It took a while, but I finally found a path through the cliffs and up to one of the scenic Sicilian roadways. Immediately, I began to hunt down the Andersons. I'm an incredibly fast rider, as you may have noticed, but I searched up and down and all around for hours with no results. Where the heck could they be?
Finally, I caught a glimpse of Scott. He was negotiating the heavy traffic out of Palermo while, I suspect, Rocky was somewhere miles ahead. I called out his name several times, but he must be getting a little hard of hearing because he didn't slow down one bit.
I may be a fast rider, but I have to admit, Scott was faster. I fell further and further behind until he was completely out of sight. It was almost as if he was racing away from me.
All I could do was keep searching all over Sicily and hope to catch up to the Andersons again somewhere down the road. Incredibly, I spotted them in the very next town--Monreale. They were about to go into a fairly old Catholic church. I heard the church is from the Norman era. I'm a big fan of Norman Lear and his All in the Family TV series, so that was kind of cool. I shouted down to the intrepid pair of bike tourists. This time, I was sure they saw me.
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They rushed inside as if they had seen a ghost. I guess they wanted to get out of the hot sun and wait for me in the apse. Within a minute I was entering the big doors of the church, but the Andersons were nowhere to be seen.
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"Yeah, they dodged out the back door," she reported.
"REALLY? THE BACK DOOR?" I exclaimed, incredulously.
"Yes, they were running as fast as they could."
I'm sure there was a legitimate explanation for that evasive maneuver, but I couldn't imagine what it was. Maybe they mistook me for some kind of deranged superfan.
I ran past the altar (remembering to genuflect like I learned in Catholic grade school) and I ran up and down the streets of Monreale to find them. It didn't take long. There was Rocky, running up a steep Monrealean street.
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Scott joined her from a side street. I started hollering loudly and waving wildly. Apparently they aren't very observant, because they sped up. So, I sped up. They made unexpected turns. I followed those turns. "What's going on here," I wondered?
When they came to a dead end, I rode up and said, "SURPRISE! It's me, Greg. Didn't you recognize me when I was waving and yelling your names?"
"Um . . . well . . . ahh . . . we meet a lot of cyclists during our travels . . ."
After I reminded them that I was the doofus from Minnesota, it all came back to them. We talked for a while. They shared stories about their bicycle travels in far-off lands like Japan, France, and Australia. I shared stories about my bike travels in far off lands like Iowa and Wisconsin.
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Soon, the subject of food came up. I told them I was very hungry on account of the rotten fish I tried to eat last night, and I invited them to join me for dinner. Scott asked where we should eat, and I suggested a place called Chef G.'s Ristorante.
"Isn't Chef G. that bombastic, egotistical celebrity chef we've been hearing about lately," asked Rocky?
"Yeah, that's the guy," I answered.
"Um, I don't know . . . I think we can do better than that," added Scott.
"I must insist," I insisted. "Earlier in my Greg-World tour, he served up the best bowl of Vietnamese Pho in the history of Vietnamese Pho's. I really want to see what he can do with Italian cooking. Plus, I have no shame in constantly promoting his ridiculously self-indulgent blog."
On our way into Chef G.'s Ristorante, we struck up a conversation with an anonymous American with Italian heritage. She was very nice and very beautiful, so we invited her to join us for dinner.
Chef G. himself welcomed our group into his tiny outdoor eatery. It was a nice personal touch, I thought. He proceeded to explain his cooking philosophy in the most exhausting detail, and he led us to his kitchen to show off some of his cooking proficiency.
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The four of us generously shared each other's meals so that we all got a taste of each dish. Shortly thereafter, Chef G. came out of the kitchen to ask what we thought of our meals. (Chef G. slipped me a $20 bill for bringing his first victims customers into the ristorante. He slipped me another $20 for linking his blog address, where the stories behind all of the dishes shown above--and many more--can be found. He slipped me another bonus of $10 after I showed him the carefully edited photo shown below.)
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All those kickbacks were nice. It meant we only had to pay 1/3 of the total bill for our meals.
After that fine dining, Scott and Rocky walked back to their hotel, the anonymous woman of Italian ancestry took a limousine to her personal jet, and I rode The Reckless Mr. Bing Bong back down to my canoe camp.
[Everything I just reported was exactly as my fuzzy memory remembered it. If you were to consult the Anderson's journal, there might be a slightly different story to their day. I'd advise you to pay more attention to that version.]
**All photos used on this page were posted with the kind permission of Scott Anderson and Chef G.
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