East coast Sicily Day 2 - Milazzo

The weather is sunny and pleasant when we wake up and after buying fish downstairs, expertly filleted and descaled by Stefano himself, we go through the centre to the coast the opposite side. The objective is to see what the beach is like and walk along the beach next to the sea. The initial impression is good. A long expanse of blue sea and empty sunny beach.

Unfortunately, after half an hour battling along the sloping shingle under a surprisingly hot and breezeless sun I officially give up and stomp off the uneven, unwelcoming and thoroughly exhausting beach. Milazzo may be nice for other reasons but definitely not for walking along that beach, and the sea, while clean and transparent is immediately deep right close to the shore so definitely not the place for me.

Somewhat disconsolately and a little tiredly we traipse back to the quiet cool of Stefano's apartment for a delicious fish lunch and a rest. In the afternoon we explore the centre of Milazzo, the port area and the shops. We also find another, equally well stocked fishmongers, and then tackle one the main issues of the holiday - granita.

Officially granita is a sort of crushed ice in different flavours, but this is absolutely an understatement. Proper Sicilian granita especially from the Messina area, which is the real home of granita, lurks invisible behind the counter of cafés and bars in stainless steel round and covered containers which keep it at a perfect temperature, never quite ice and never reduced to slush. Not a tourist invention, we had already noticed when going through Milazzo at 'breakfast' time that most people sitting or standing in or out of bars were having granita and the typical round 'brioche'. But it seemed the same was also an excellent idea for merenda so we decided to join in. What makes it special may well be, apart from the excellent quality of the granita itself, the whipped cream which fills the other half of the transparent glass 'mug'.

Delicious, as everything connected with food and drink in Sicily tends to be. We walk back via the tourist office and the port to check up on public transport for our trip to Messina the next day, and then after another stroll along the promenade and back through the shops we call it a day.