A Country Girl in Italy: Ragusa, Sicily

My husband James and I visited Ragusa with our son Micah & his wife Jancy in 2018. We rode an overnight train to Palermo and toured a little bit around Palermo, stayed in a hotel, and then drove in a rental car across Sicily to Ragusa.

About an hour into our trip, the check engine light came on and the turbo cut out on our car and we lost power. It was still driving, it just wouldn't go as fast. We were in the middle of nowhere and didn't have cell service, so we kept driving. We considered our options. If we called the Hertz in Palermo, they would probably tell us to turn around and come back. Once we had cell service we looked online and saw that Ragusa had a Hertz location, so we decided that we were already halfway there, we may as well keep going. So we drove all the way to Ragusa. We tried for a while to find the Hertz, with no luck, even after calling them for a location. But it turns out they didn't have a car for us anyway, so we decided to just try our luck and drive back to Palermo as planned.

First we toured Ragusa. Ragusa was Micah's first area when he served a mission for our church. The main thing he wanted us to do in Ragusa was to try a horse meat sandwich. He really liked the horse meat sandwiches when he tried them. Of course, Jancy and I didn't want to eat horsemeat at all. But James and Micah both had a horse meat sandwich, and claim that they loved it.

Ragusa reminded me a lot of San Francisco with its very steep streets. We visited the ancient city Ibla. That was some of the first photos that Micah sent from his mission. It's one of my favorite tag photos from him. We went to visit his friends the Lo Monicos. He and Elder Rusch had given their daughter a Minion for Christmas while he was there. She brought it out to show him when we went to visit.

After we had toured Ragusa, including seeing his apartment and the "doll church" and the pretty canyon that he used to explore in, then we drove our "check engine light" car back to Palermo to catch our ferry. When we turned the car back into Hertz, James told them about the check engine light and what had happened and they said, "oh, it's probably fine." :) So I guess they're going to just use the car until it dies.

Ragusa was the only place in Italy so far that I encountered someone who didn't speak English. Micah had gone to the bathroom and I was trying to ask the girl at the deli what on earth the pizza with the french fries on it was. She couldn't understand me at all. The other people in her shop also couldn't understand me. Ragusa isn't a tourist town. They don't need to speak English. Finally Micah came back and interpreted for us. And I did buy the pizza with the french fries on it. They make it because they think it's what Americans want to eat. But it wasn't good at all. It was like a cheese breadstick with french fries on it. And not very good french fries either. That was the only not-good thing that I have eaten in Italy.

The beautiful views headed to Ragusa, as we drove across the island of Sicily.

The road to Ragusa

We saw a lot of these prickly pears growing, both on their own in nature as well as on farms.

The check engine light in our rental car

The streets in Ragusa

You can't really tell how steep the streets were

James eating his horse meat sandwich

Welcome to Ragusa
Sun, Art, and Culture

The ancient city Ibla

We found our mazda in Ragusa!

Micah's apartment up on the second floor

Steep streets of Ragusa

The "doll church" as they call it. I'm not sure why they call it that. I guess because it's cute. It's the meetinghouse for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Ragusa.