Monday, June 6

I left the nice apartment and at a local bakery, bought some yummy pizza bread with olives, for just 30 cents - this place was really not all too expensive.I soon reached the outskirts of Argigento. The town, like many others in Sicily, is on a hilltop and a very long and steep two-by-two lane highway led to the top, however, two of these four lanes were closed to traffic, so there was hardly any place left for cars to veering out. At the bottom of the hill, I thought if I shall survive this, I'll survive anything. We'll, it took me quite a while, silently praying for good driving skills of the Sicilian drivers, but made it to the top.

Then it was a bit of confusion getting to the archeological site, people sending me on wild goose chase in two different directions. It turned out everyone was right, as the place actually had two entrances, quite some ways from the other, one on a hilltop, the other in the valley. I ended up at the bottom entrance, left my bike there under the watch of a souvenir shop owner and entered the site.Ancient Akragas, as it is called, covers a huge area—much of which is still unexcavated today — but is exemplified by the famous "Valley of the Temples". This comprises a large sacred area on the south side of the ancient city where seven monumental Greek temples in theDiric style were constructed about 2,500 years ago. Now excavated and partially restored, they constitute some of the largest and best-preserved ancient Greek buildings outside of Greece itself.According to estimates, there were hundreds of thousands (!) of inhabitants.

It took me two hours to marvel at the site, walking uphill for some 2 kilometers, wondering at the might of this culture having erected such impressive structures and when I got back to the hill, I literally ran back to my bike – despite the heat, I wanted to save some time. Leaving the place, at a large round-about, I found a truck selling cold watermelon, I picked one of 4 kilos – it was chilled and was this fruit was really refreshing (it is called “Greek melon” in my native Hungarian – perhaps no coincidence).

What followed then was perhaps the most treacherous climb of the tour , or at least one of the worst I had ever had. It was really freaking hot, around noon, and the road led up to the town of Favara. Oh my good God. It was just 10 kilometers long, biking there was actually prohibited, but no one cares about such things here in Sicily. Each meter was a real suffering, I was questioning the purpose of my very existence. There must have been a McDonald's in Argigento, I have never seen so much hamburger wraps and sundae cups lining the road – what a shame! I recall two youngsters passing me on their scooters, cynically laughing at me. Whatever, after a very long struggle, I was pleased to have made it to Favara, where I must have drank like a gallon of water. The center of the town was quite impressive, large baroque churches crowning the narrow streets.

When I left, my suffering continued - Google Maps wanted, yet again, to help by making the ride shorter, for that, a lot steeper, with that on a road that was full of potholes. A father was cheering me on as he watched me and his young son doing gardenwork in the extreme heat. I made it to the next small town, Canicatti, where I cooled down with some ice cream and lots of water.

There I noticed my front wheel being rather soft - oh no, I hate punctures. I was hoping it wasn't one, so I pumped it full and rode on. This did not do the trick, a few miles later the wheel was soft again. For most cyclists, this is an easy operation, not for me - it takes me like an hour. In Sommatino, I managed to find an OK B&B for Eur 25, the second “B”, the one depicting the breakfast, meant one pre-packed, rather sorry-looking croissant and a coffee - not much. Anyhow, as the heat cooled down, I patched my wheel and also the mattress, it did have a second hole.I slept really well after this day...