School trip

Lara ( 15 years old) went on a school trip to Sicily last year. In this article she describes some of the various sights she visited with her class.

Last year, I went on a school trip to Sicily. I stayed in Palermo for a week from March 12th to March 17th. The tour was organized for all the students who had been learning Latin for two years.

On March 12th we flew from Paris to Milan. My school friends and I were on time at the airport but my teachers arrived late!At 7.30am we took off and stopped over Milan.

When we arrived at our hotel,my friends and I were surprised because our first hotel was great, it was a four-star hotel with a swimming pool. The hotel was in the centre of Palermo and we had lunch in a beautiful garden.

After visiting Palermo we visited Chiesa di S.Maria Catena church. Then we walked across the Spanish Door. Some students made a speech about Palermo. Palermo is the biggest city in Sicily. Personally I think it is a dirty city because there was rubbish everywhere and the ground was laid with about 25 umbrellas!!In the evening we came back to the hotel and had dinner, we had a strange local green cake it was disgusting.

Thanks to our teacher who woke us up, every morning was a nightmare because she wore pyjamas with teddy bear patterns and pink bunny-shaped slippers!

On March 13th we had breakfast and then took the bus to Monreale. We visited Duomo church. Duomo church was built in the 12th century by Guillaume Le Bon , the church is of a Bizantine, Norman and Muslim style. After we visited the cloister we returned to Palermo and went to the " Palace of the Normans" after having visited Palermo's cathedral. The building was constructed on a Mosque and a cimentary , the principal front is Islamic.

Next we went back to the hotel, had dinner and finally we had a test about the sights we had visited.On March 14th we took the bus and got to Selinunte and we climbed up the Temple then we went to Agrigente and visited a lot of temples like Junon's Temple, Temple of the Concorde, Jupiter's Temple, Hercule's Temple and Dioscur's Temple. The Hercule's Temple is in ruins so we could climbed up the remains.On March 15th we visited "La villa Casale" It is a Roman house in really good condition. Then we travelled by bus to Syracuse where we looked around Syracuse's theatre, Hiron's Altar, Archimedes' Place...

Then we went to Ortigia Island where we got lost, but we managed to find our way to our hotel.

OnThursday 16th, we went to Taormine and visited the Theatre. This theatre has still got the walls which surrounded the stage. In the afternoon we went shopping for souvenirs and took the bus again back to Palermo.

On Friday 17th we went to the airport and flew back to Paris. We arrived at 6.00pm in Paris.

I enjoyed my school trip to Sicily .

Acknowledgements: Photos provided under Creative Commons Licence by : Caribb ( plane) Xerones ( Palermo), Astilly ( Cloister), Growdy.Blue ( Palermo's Cathedral ,Duomo Church Monreale and Selinunte temple) progoddess ( green cake )), Davidjennings ( Agrigento), Branimir ( Syracuse theatre), Reziemba ( Ortigia island) via Flickr.