We were up early to get to the airport for our flight to Sicily. Something that amazed me was that people are allowed to take their pets on board with them!!
There were 2 dogs on our flight.
We landed in Palermo and SO's aunt and cousin were there to pick us up. They live about 2 hours away in a tiny village called Santa Elisabetta, which is in the province of Agrigento. This is were SO's father grew up. The whole family moved to SA in the 60s, and the middle brother moved back about 10 years ago.
On the way to their house we stopped at a petrol station and had our first Sicilian delight...arancini. Arancini are rice balls stuffed with bolognese sauce and cheese, coated with breadcrumbs and deep fried.
We eventually arrived at their house, which is slightly out of the village, on top of a hill with beautiful views of the Sicilian countryside.
They live a lot off the land...they have olive trees which give them enough olive oil to last for a year. Prickly pears grow wild all over Sicily and were in season while we were there, so we had lots of them!
They also have almond trees and we were able to pick the almonds and enjoy them straight off the tree...delicious!
SO's aunt is always drying, pickling or making jam from some fruit or vegetable.
As soon as we arrived we picked figs off the tree in their garden!
The ground floor of the house is built right up against the rock on the hillside, so they very cleverly made it into a wine cellar!
That night we had a lovely al fresco dinner with the family!!
SO's aunt used to have a restaurant in SA and is quite the cook, so we had lovely food while we were there! Here she is with one of her sons, SO's cousin, who spends his time between SA and Sicily.
SO's uncle is the one in the green shirt.
The Brat next to the other cousin.
They have 5 cats and 3 dogs...I was missing our animals quite a lot so it was nice to have someone else's animals to cuddle!
It was in the period when Noah was born 
