I sense the middle-aged man across the aisle from me on the Boston to Frankfurt leg of this journey has some kind of breathing problem. When I subtly peek around, I see a breathing apparatus. Hearing him struggle exacerbates my usual flying ailments. It reminds me of nephew Stefano’s story about watching Mask on a flight and increasingly feeling as if he couldn’t breathe.

Eventually, I catch my own breath.

I notice out the window the patchwork of farmed fields made familiar by airplane flights and naive art. This time, the patch is made more surreal by bright yellow squares around Frankfurt. The woman next to me thinks it may be “rap” … used to make oil. I say “Oh, rapeseed oil?” which she seems not to recognize.

Groupthink

I have deep reservations about traveling with tour groups. I always learned more about places when we arranged our own trips. And the chance a group is dominated by wingnuts is very risky these days. Nonetheless, my patience for logistics management fades with age. And I’m beginning to appreciate not arranging every single rendezvous and connection.

The tour company for this trip had the cute gimmick of calling its tour operators “CEOs”—a turnoff for me. Even if the “E” was supposed to stand for “Experience,” rather than “Executive,” who needs that on vacation, especially in retirement?

Fortunately, our CEO defied the stereotype. Gianluca is a Catania native who is passionate about Sicily and ancient history. He is pursuing an advanced degree in archeology in Turin, about as far as you can get from Sicily and still be in Italy. I made a reference to an unlikely monument on Boston City Hall Plaza commemorating the Battle of Thermopylae in a war between Sparta and Persia, which Gianluca seemed to appreciate. I opened a hydrant of historical info about ancient wars and cultures.

But any illusion that this touring group might be as simpatico as the one we recently met in Costa Rica was dashed on our minibus ride to Siracusa. When the heater in the bus wouldn’t go off (and the windows inexplicably can’t be opened) a half dozen fellow travelers from California and Australia huffed and puffed, including one who tried to enlist the group to demand refunds from the tour operator. That guest complained audibly that Gianluca’s history lessons would be forgotten in five minutes and should be replaced with practical talk about things like current rent prices.

Later, one son in a co-traveling family of five got into a physical altercation with a German tourist near a Greek temple in the valley of the temples. A red line, I thought. Fortunately, we were also traveling with longtime friends from home Dave and Karen for the first half of the trip, the Southern leg from Catania, through Syracuse around the island’s south coast and up to Palermo.

In Palermo, we met a new group for the Northern leg, which would make its way back to Catania via Cefalu and the Aeolian Islands. This new group included world travelers, an opera singer, but also the obligatory complainers, Ugly Americans and a less philanthropical CEO. Gianluca had set the bar too high.

First thing we do, let’s eat all the specialties

In Catania, I went straight for the local specialties I’d been reading about. First, a sea urchin and pasta lunch with the urchins cooked down to a rich thick sauce. I assured myself of likely health benefits of this ricci di mare (which I quickly offset with a dinner with of horsemeat “slices” that were surprisingly tender but left a guilty aftertaste)—as well as a snack of pistachio granita with whipped cream.

Sicily was lush and green, though some of its landscape is marred by electrical pylons (as well as solar farms and wind turbines). The ride through the countryside also revealed vast greenhouses, some growing carob, used to make gelato creamier, and interesting stonewalls, some centuries old.

Also notable were the many crumbling stone houses, which may not be so much classical relics as homes abandoned during more recent decades of Sicily’s up-and-down economy. And many sleek tunnels (for cars and trains) and soaring highway bridges—standing tribute to famed Italian engineering.

The landscape also featured beautiful wild growth of red poppies, pink flowers resembling milkweed, brilliant yellow flowers (fennel or perhaps rap?), cactus, Queen Anne’s Lace. I was captivated by prevalent orange and lemon groves on farms but also in front of homes and schools. And plantations of cactusy-looking prickly pears, known as “figs from India.” In the North, I spied lots of morning glories and lantanas growing along highway underpasses.

From Catania, we traveled to Siracusa, an enchanting city by the Ionian Sea that was once at the center of the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Siracusa—Syracuse to us—was second only to Athens in power in the region known as Magna Graecia (Greater Greece) … nothing like its cousin near the Finger Lakes.

We take a cooking class on arrival in Siracusa and learn how to make arancini, the iconic Sicilian stuffed riceball. The ones I made in Siracusa were a bit of a flop, compared with the one I ordered with squid ink in a Catania cafe (or for that matter, the ones I buy on occasion in Boston’s North End). In Siracusa, we also visited the Parco Archeologico della Neapolis. The ancient ruins of theaters and quarries are fascinating, but the not-so-classicist in me is thrown off by the well-meaning juxtaposition around the park of works by the more contemporary Polish sculptor Igor Mitoraj.

Was there beach volleyball in antiquity? Among the stunning Roman mosaics at Villa Romana del Casale in the hilltop town of Piazza Armerina is one featuring women competing in discus-throwing, track and ballgames, and wearing something akin to modern bikinis.

In the cities

Some friends at home and mainstream reviewers like to diss Palermo. They call it gritty. As if that’s a bad thing. To the contrary, it and Catania, Sicily’s second city, are great centers of Sicilian life. Still, the 11th century Monreale Cathedral, on the edge of Palermo, famous for its gold mosaic tiles, struck me Goddy and gaudy.

One of our always-complaining fellow travelers had let loose on the tour’s choice of hotel in Palermo. He was right in a way. The hotel in the old section of Palermo offered free earplugs for guests facing the little square, including us. Between room-shaking bassy music pulsating out of at least one of the bars, car alarms, unscheduled fireworks, motorcycles racing over the piazza’s curbstones, this may be the noisiest place I’ve ever experienced. Through it all, though, it was cheering to see young kids playing soccer in the square.

Also don’t miss two cheek-to-jowl Palermo botanical gardens that offer a green oasis near the city’s harbor—one, a small but serious effort including showcases of specimens and historical books on botany, the second a run-down, but honest, public garden.

Lung and spleen delight

I finally had my much anticipated lung and spleen sandwich at an excellent market in Palermo. Unhealthy to be sure. But the way the offaly fat soaks the fresh Italian bun is exquisite! Much like my memory of saturated ends of sub rolls from Kyser’s steak bombs in Beverly (which at least had the healthier grease of sautéed green peppers and onions mixed in).

A couple hours from Palermo, the Aeolian Islands, a small archipelago of volcanic lands, brought me right back to reading Greek myths as a child with my brother Bill and as a father with my son Bill. And to some extent, references to those myths in the Greek and Roman stories I’d just revisited at sites in Sicily. The thickly greened islands of strange geometric shapes and geologic miracles did seem to hold monsters and heroes. The forests seemed filled with fates and feats.

The volcano on Stromboli sent clouds of smoke out its crater with a somewhat fiery belch theoretically every 15 or so minutes. But waiting for the next one from our boat idling off the coast reminded me of watching with my kids for shooting stars and a lesson: witnessing great acts of nature requires a patience I sometimes lack.

A main reason for the Sicily trip in the first place was to get away from the cold, wet of New England. As we flew back on May 17, I looked down on small villages of Newfoundland—some of their streets were still covered in snow.