Sheltering from a storm in San Vito Lo Capo

No video update today folks, I have more bags than Tesco under my eyes right now – read on to find out why.

Dave the motorhome is in hiding, he is parked up between two, three storey, buildings which form part of the grid-like street system here in San Vito Lo Capo at the north-west tip of Sicily (N38.17699 E12.73408).

Last night our quiet little bay grew increasingly noisier as the wind howled around Dave. We hunkered down inside and watched a film at full volume, then carefully opened Dave’s door so Jay could take Charlie for a walk. We’d been joined by an Austrian motorhome, we were the only two vehicles in the car park.

As the night progressed the wind grew stronger, Jay likened it to trying to sleep in a washing machine – but there was no sleep to be had. Dave creaked like a ship, the wind whistled like a horror movie soundtrack and rocked us so much I thought we’d be on the other side of the car park by the morning pinned against our neighbours, but at 3pm, they had had enough. I watched as they blearily-eyed shuffled their van around the car park, desperately trying to find a position and angle that limited the rocking. We thought about moving to somewhere else, but peering out at the trees being bent double and flickering street lights we decided to stay put, away from anything that could fall on us. If you wonder what it sounds like to be in Dave in a storm, click below!

A noisy night in Dave!

Around 4am a loud bang heralded the flipping of the bins, two were thrown flat on the ground (and I’m talking big industrial bins here) and one was blown on its wheels across the car park and flipped unceremoniously into the stream running down into the sea. Our neighbours had moved again, but we could still see their van rock. So that was how the night went, sleepless, Charlie even took to hiding under the table. This morning it was no better, so at 6.30am we moved across to the edge of the car park hoping the Austrian van would provide some shelter.

It must have helped a bit, or exhaustion kicked in, as we were woken at 7am by the bin men putting the bins upright, only for one of them to fall over again as soon as the truck had left the car park. At 9am our neighbours had moved again, but we didn’t fancy another dance with them, so we stayed put and dozed for a while. Another bin lorry arrived about 9.30 to stand the errant bin up again, it blew over once more as they drove up the hill out of the car park.

Both groggy with sleep we set off north to Scopello to see a deserted tuna factory in a setting which is described in our Rough Guide to Italy as ‘too picturesque to be true’. It seems that the locals have cottoned on to this and numerous Private signs have popped up, and a charge of €3 put in place to see it. Jay snapped a photo from the road, we weren’t in the mood for sightseeing and it was still flippin’ windy.

Scopello tuna factory, it does look pretty, but we’ll save it for another trip!

As we made our way across the bottom of the peninsular, we passed police cars blocking off roads, down those roads were undoubtedly what we had seen along a few of the wider roads we took – crews working to remove fallen trees and fix power lines. I wouldn’t want to be working at Sicily Power today!

One big tree came down here, no wonder the street lights were going off!

More tree, power line problems being solved.

The co-ordinates for a free parking place we had took us to an exposed stretch of beach, not fancying another sleepless night we carried on north, stopping in a lay-by, with a house protecting us from the storm. During this break from rocking we had a huge lunch, our fridge is struggling to cool at the moment due to the wind, so our big Lidl shop is in jeopardy. Even though it would probably only be around €20 worth of food, it’s better in our stomachs than the bin. When we checked out the weather report amazingly it said it would all clear up later. Looking at the black skies around us we really didn’t think they had it right, so ploughed on north to the town of San Vito Lo Capo in the hope of finding some shelter.

Huge quarries in the hills around us, and most stuff in town made of marble – shop local!

Making for the centre of the town we turned and parked up in the street surrounded by the tallest buildings in the town and blissfully wind free. Around us are no parking signs with a picture of a tow truck underneath, either side of us are Italian cars parked up – sometimes we love their lack of respect for the rules. This afternoon we’ve chilled out, napped, walked on the beach and had a look around the town. Jay has cooked us up some more of our partially defrosted freezer food so we’ve had tasty meatballs for tea.

Charlie is writing something in the sand, it might be SOS!

Jay naps on Charlie by San Vito lo Capo beach. It’s still windy with a Gibraltarian style rock looming over it.

Along the seafront the wind has finally dropped and the sun even made an appearance for a couple of minutes. Tonight I suspect we’ll sleep like logs, the joys of motorhoming in the winter!

The church in San Vito lo Capo, was built to protect from pirates – I think it would work!

Modern art inside the church – at least their clothes look modern.

Ju x