{"id":2320,"date":"2016-04-30T01:36:39","date_gmt":"2016-04-30T07:36:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dltwt.com\/?p=2320"},"modified":"2016-04-30T01:42:13","modified_gmt":"2016-04-30T07:42:13","slug":"hilltop-views-a-farmland-temple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/?p=2320","title":{"rendered":"Hilltop Views & A Farmland Temple"},"content":{"rendered":"
After arriving in Palermo, Sicily on Tuesday,\u00a0\u00a0we headed off to see the old city of Erice on Wednesday.\u00a0 It sits high on a hill overlooking the Mediterranean. \u00a0Our GPS sent us on a wild goose chase through winding, narrow streets to the center of the “new” town of Erice.\u00a0 The new town was far below the cliffs on which the original Erice stood.\u00a0 We could see the very winding road that led to the top; however it was challenging to find it.\u00a0 Erice was one of the nicest hilltop towns we have ever visited because it hasn’t been over developed as a tourist site. There were restaurants, a few ceramic shops and a limited number of tourist junk shops. The town has several castles that were built through the centuries as well as a few churches. What it will never lose is the outstanding views that you get after you drive up the long very curvy road. We were also surprised by the limited tour buses and, in general, the lack of tourists. We wandered the streets, enjoyed the views and this quaint city.<\/div>\n
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We then decided to visit the Greek ruins of Segesta.\u00a0 The Romans and the Arabs eventually took possession of Segesta and it was completely abandoned sometime during the middle ages.\u00a0 This desertion allowed the ruins to survive relatively untouched.\u00a0 It was fascinating to see the remains of three distinct time periods laid bare.<\/p>\n

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The primary attraction here is a large Doric Greek temple sitting on a hillside in the farm lands. It is one of the most well-preserved Greek temples in the entire world.\u00a0 One could be easily be fooled into thinking that the temple was built one hundred years ago instead of twenty-six hundred! \u00a0It is interesting that the non-fluted columns were a series of 3-4 ft high cut stones set on top of each other versus the one piece Roman columns seen elsewhere.\u00a0 It may have been because of the type of stone, cutting or moving technology that may have differed between the periods. There was never a roof on this temple.\u00a0 It is noteworthy that this exceptional Greek temple was built in this predominately non-Greek town.\u00a0 We read an interesting summary about Segesta.\u00a0 It seems that the city had been looking to Athens for assistance in its struggle against Selinute (another area of ruins, we did not visit).\u00a0 To insure the Greeks would be visibly impressed with Segesta’s size and importance, a Greek temple was quickly constructed.\u00a0 Once the alliance was secured, the town people never bothered to complete the temple.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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We then hiked up a hill to see various ruins and an amphitheater dating back, in some cases, to 400+ BC.\u00a0The views from the amphitheater looked over the Gulf of Castellammare.\u00a0 During the summer, productions are often staged here.<\/div>\n
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\"Erice's<\/a>
Erice’s main street (limited tourist shops!)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The<\/a>
The view from Erice<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A<\/a>
A number of castles were built in Erice<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"OLYMPUS<\/a>
View from Erice<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Erice's<\/a>
Erice’s town square (with only one busload of tourists!)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"One<\/a>
One of the lovely Erice churches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bread<\/a>
Bread “shrine” at an Erice cafe<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Fanciest<\/a>
Fanciest bakery in Erice<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"OLYMPUS<\/a>
The Greek temple in the farmland<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Selfie<\/a>
Selfie at the Greek<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"OLYMPUS<\/a>
Note the sections of the columns (vs. one piece)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\"Evening<\/a>
Evening at the marina at our hotel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After arriving in Palermo, Sicily on Tuesday,\u00a0\u00a0we headed off to see the old city of Erice on Wednesday.\u00a0 It sits high on a hill overlooking the Mediterranean. \u00a0Our GPS sent us on a wild goose chase through winding, narrow streets to the center of the “new” town of Erice.\u00a0 The new town was far below … Continue reading Hilltop Views & A Farmland Temple<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Si9J-Bq","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2320"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2324,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2320\/revisions\/2324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dltwt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}