last time on delightful travellers we discovered the beautiful coastal city of cefalu it was hard
to leave this place but sadly it's time to move on in this video we'll be exploring Sicily's second
biggest city Catania we've heard mixed things about this place but we're here to find out what
it's all about I'm Anna and this is Trevor in this series we're exploring the south of Italy
join us on our adventures by hitting subscribe and clicking the like button an extra thank you to our
channel members and patrons for making these videos possible now let's check out the city
foreign
everyone we've been here for a few days now and let us tell you
that we are absolutely digging this city and those of you that have been
following along probably know that we were recently larima we started our Sicilian
so Catania is in fact the second biggest city here in Sicily right after Palermo the
population of the actual city is just over 300 000 but the whole metropolitan area has
1.1 million well look where we're starting things off today this might be the oldest
looking church I've ever seen in my life but I can assure you it is not yeah this actually
dates back from the 1600s so in the scheme of things it's really not that old also believe it
or not this is not the main Cathedral here in Catania this is a church called The Church of
San Marina San Nicolo Lorina all right so the plan is to go in this thing and see what it's
all about huh but there's an actual purpose that we came here so people say Catania is famous for
being the city that's right on the ionian sea but also right next to the very famous volcano Aetna
and apparently from the rooftop here you can see the view of both well the inside of this church
is absolutely beautiful as you can see all these old pillars really amazing paintings on the wall
but we made our way up these stairs and that's why I'm out of breath you guys because we just climbed
all the way to the top of this thing four views like this so as promised you get amazing views
of Catania from up on this church Also let's talk about Mount Aetna you cannot miss this when you're
up here this my friends is an active volcano and yes it's actually that close to the city here
so I'm pretty sure Mount Aetna is actually the most active volcano in all of Europe and I could
be wrong here but I don't know if we've ever actually been around an active volcano before
we've been around lots of like dormant ones but yeah I don't know this might be a first for us
and I think maybe I'm wrong someone can correct me if I'm wrong is there smoke coming out of
there right now I first thought it was clouds but it seems to be going in an upwards motion
so I think maybe it's smoking right now so I'm pretty sure this city has been destroyed a few
times from that volcano and various earthquakes over hundreds maybe even thousands of years so
let's hope it does not happen today for us and all of our sake we've now come over to a Sicilian
cafe because we we just saw Mount Aetna and now we're going to eat Mount Etna look at this little
guy so this is arancini and what's unique here in the city is they make them a little bit different
now remember in Palermo we had these and they were like a ball they were very circular this
is shaped just like Edna how cool is that I went for the Ragu which is like the classic and I think
what I'm gonna do is my plan of attack is just to bite the top right off this thing here we go
man these things are so good they are the perfect lunch meal for us now in this one there is some
beef you can see kind of like a tomato style sauce it's basically a ball of rice that's deep
fried now the one I had in Palermo had peas in it I don't believe this one does I'm trying to
compare the two which one I like better I just had one bite so far so I'm gonna have to think
on it I will say though they're both equally very tasty take a look what I got mine is actually in
the shape of a ball this is a non-classic one so on the menu here they have a few different
Classics and then some like Originals I guess they call them so it's got cornflake
crumbs on the outside and there's vegetables onions and smoked provolone on the inside
oh yeah I love how it's super crunchy that is on the outside because of the cornflake crumbs like
you can hear the crunches you bite into it and then it's a lot more creamy on the inside it's
actually I think caramelized onions so that's the first taste I get but you also get a smoky flavor
from the I think it's the provolone there's also vegetables in here but I'm not sure what
type maybe spinach it looks a little dark I'm not sure but it's really delicious so as good as that
arancini was I still don't think it was quite as good as the ones we had in Palermo in the
very first video our first impressions of Palermo and Sicily off mine was really good but I think
the Ragu is probably like yeah it's traditional for a reason I've been talking about that first
Aaron China for a long time now since we got here so I'm hoping to find one just as good as
that this is what traveling in Italy is all about we were just walking down the street and we just
happened upon these ancient ruins I think we should probably go inside and check it out
uh holy moly this is absolutely crazy you would never think this is right in the middle of the
City just off of random sidewalk look at this place like how many hundreds of years is this
so to be honest it's really hard to find any information out about this place online what I
did see was on the map it has this as listed as a Greek Theater for when I read about it
outside just a little plaque outside it said it's actually a Roman Theater but also on the
map you see in another location a Roman Theater so I don't know if there's two separate theaters
or if it's just the map that's all messed up so I know one thing we are doing a lot of stairs today
I mean a lot we already climbed all those stairs at the church in the first of the video now we're
here walking around this thing on a 30 degree day huh yeah I'm trying to do some video back
here for maybe an Instagram reel so those those of you that follow us on Instagram no we do a
lot of stories but we're not so good about posting photos and reels we need to get better about that
trying to do at least a few videos by the time this comes out maybe you'll know if we actually
succeeded or not yeah and if you want to follow us in real time while we're making our way around
Italy you can follow us on Instagram because we do Post stories we're actually good at that one
it's funny you can see all these like Windows and balconies around here and I realize people
actually live in those places can you imagine living in a place and just overlooking like
an old ancient Roman Theater I know just like you know waking up having your coffee staring at this
it's pretty neat not only is there that big theater you can just kind of walk around
behind it amongst all these ruins look at that it's like all this Rubble like who knows when
that was destroyed it's just sitting there you can walk right up to it this place is really
cool definitely recommended if you're in the city here well would you look at that we found another
beautiful Square here in Catania there are a lot of squares here but this happens to be the
main one in the city have the Cathedral of Catania behind me there's also in the center of the square
a fountain with an elephant which apparently is a symbol of the city can't again I can't seem
to find out a lot about this city there's not a lot of information online about all the things
that are happening here but why is an elephant a symbol of the city someone explain it in the
comments below please so it's a little later now in the day and we've come over to a more
of a local area which is very beautiful but it's so quiet here so let's face it we've been doing
touristic things so far that's not all we do on the channel we just had to you know get a few of
those under our belts while we're in the city here we did get a beer we one of the things I wanted to
mention about the touristic things is the reason we're trying to counter that right now at a local
spot with the beers we're trying to figure out one of the goals on the channel is to try to figure
out where we might live now what I mean by that is we might spend months in the city like this do we
want to do we not want to that's what we're trying to figure out today but we can tell you this this
is the kind of stuff we're loving in the city so far you have the touristic things but this local
stuff this is it back in one of our Palermo videos we had mentioned that we weren't quite sure what
to expect before coming to Sicily because a lot of people complain that some of the neighborhoods
feel gritty and dirty and there's lots of garbage around and in polaro we didn't find that too bad I
mean there was more garbage than a lot of places but it wasn't overly dirty and then we came here
and the first thing we noticed when we got off the train was a lot of garbage on the streets
that sounds like robot just I'm about to start on a really bad story but I'm really not we're really
enjoying the city to be honest and it reminded me a little bit of back a few years ago we went
to Vienna which is a very very clean City so I wouldn't so much compared to Polar mobile
let's pretend for a second and then we went to Budapest right after and again the first thing
we noticed was all the garbage especially coming from such a clean City that the contrast was huge
however we ended up loving Budapest it's one of our favorite cities ever despite garbage
and graffiti and it kind of adds to it here we're finding areas that actually like this that remind
us a lot about attachment the place we're at right now is called barnat I think I'm pronouncing it
right but take a look at this place how cute how quaint is this it's very Bohemian there's
all these like missed matched chairs if you happen to be wondering the beer is really good and it's
very affordable I think this was under five euro which is hard to find for a beer this size while
you're in the city while you're in Italy for that matter but what we're finding so far in this city
is the vibe is entirely different than Palermo it's very young it's a very young vibe to this
city and what we really like about it is it's not just Italian food and I know if any Italians are
watching you'd be like of course but we've been in some places so far in Italy that it's it's almost
always Italian food here there's everything we even had Korean food the other night and
Mexican food one day and it was top-notch that's something we're really enjoying about the city so
far so we mentioned Korean food earlier here and now we're on the hunt to go back to that place
because we figured we won't be able to get that sure so don't be mad at us we will definitely
be making lots of Italian foods actually after this going to a smaller town so we figured it'd
be harder to get any sort of thing that's not Italian exactly so if we're gonna do it for one
last thing that's Korean so the street we're on right now is pedestrian only you can probably
tell that it is called I think it's called it's basically named after Aetna I think it's ednia
etnia so maybe someone could correct us if we're wrong so cool now I'm just gonna say
really quick we're from a town city I should say in Nova Scotia called Halifax and Spring
Garden Road where we're from kind of almost went to pedestrian then it didn't and I just wish our
city could do that kind of stuff because look at this this is awesome and this Street's way
bigger than Spring Garden Road it is so just to clarify a few things for people that don't know
Spring Garden Road is like the main shopping Road and they tried to shut it down to traffic except
for buses and it they I think it lasted like a week there's one pedestrian only Street in all
of Halifax and it's pretty short yeah so there you have it we love our city where we're from but
when we're in bigger cities like this we realize like change can happen and look how amazing this
is everyone's out having such a great time we're having a great time because we're trying to find
some great food we've been on a few umbrella streets in the world and they actually have
a couple in this city but I don't know maybe this is the first time we've been on one with
music notes over what yeah we've never been on a music note Street maybe they are starting a trend
huh they're starting a trip I also see like a bunch of ribbons up that way too no no no no
foreign so we made it to the restaurant here it is called Panda and it is on one of our favorite
streets in the entire city via gemalero we ordered some wine this is a Sicilian wine
it is a gorilla it's a dry white wine and we got some delicious food on the way for the record we
did say earlier we've eaten here before but it was that good we just had to come back here so
tonight we decided to go for some dumplings which we did not try last time we were here we ordered
two different kinds and the vegan ones came out first so like I said they are vegan and I think
these ones are fried or pan fried crispy these are very hard to pick up with chopsticks I will
say that at least metal Chopsticks we didn't show you that part for a reason oh those are
super hot but they're really really yummy super crispy and crunchy on the outside much like the
arancini we had today except it tastes very very differently I can't really tell what veggies they
have on the inside but then you dip it in that soy sauce and oh it's so good next up we decided
to get some pork steamed dumplings you can see some sesame seeds on here I don't think there's
going to be many vegetables but that's fine I'm gonna take it over this way I don't know if you
guys can see it dip it in some of this delicious it's kind of a soy sauce they told me it's like
a secret sauce and just try this guy out the pork is so so Savory in this full of flavor the sesame
seeds come through as well and right now this like the steam bun itself is just coated and
all of that delicious sauce is so good you guys I don't know how I can choose a winner between
the two but we got more food coming up next up on the list one we also haven't tried the last
time we were here it's kimchi bookingbop I might be saying that incorrectly but it's basically like
rice with kimchi and a fried egg on top look at that beauty I'm gonna break it oh wow oh yeah
yeah that looks good yeah oh you guys after all this Italian food I can't even begin to tell you
how excited I am if I can actually pick it up with my Chopsticks maybe I should be eating this
with a spoon but I'm gonna attempt this that's right it's got some kimchi again all stuff we
don't normally expect to find when you're in Italy but I'd love that we can get this here
in case you couldn't tell that is so good I don't know if you guys know what kimchi is if you're not
used to Korean food you might not know but it's basically fermented cabbage which sounds kind of
gross but it's so good really good for you too because it is fermented and the rice and the
Egg and there's a little bit of spiciness to it this is delicious all right the main events about
to happen here and you think um some major like operation is about to go down here and it is we're
about to eat some chicken wings now any Americans out there or Canadians like us watching this might
seem corn to wear some gloves but this is pretty practical plus these are hot it helps uh with the
heat and yeah these look really good can you guys see those whoo baby so these are Korean chicken
wings but they're go-to Jang chicken wings and they asked us how spicy we wanted them and we said
as high as you can possibly go so we noticed in Italy like a lot of Italians I don't think anyway
correct me if I'm wrong don't really go for spicy food we do all you guys to follow us you know we
do so you can see this sauce there's some peanuts on here green onions and I'm just going to try it
with these fancy gloves on here I still can't believe I'm wearing gloves with chicken wings
on it I can already picture the comments that are about to happen but let's just go for it
now for a few weeks and eating mainly Italian food and a lot of street food this is just a
pure treat These Wings Are just something special and we've had Korean food around the world in
different places but these are right up there there's a reason we came back like I said I'm
so glad we did if you guys are watching you're gonna have to come here I know you're coming
here for Italian food but if you're you have like a two-week vacation or something like that you're
going to want to switch it up come to this place these little guys are so so delicious all right
well we finished up and now it is time to compare well Catania versus Palermo we've
been talking about that a lot in the video what do we prefer okay so I think if maybe if you're
just coming on a very short vacation and you want like a super touristy Place Palermo is maybe for
you yeah however for us it's like as we said we're looking for places that we could potentially live
that has a great vibe to it so katania totally wins there yeah so the reasons for that is we
just prefer the vibe here it feels younger and we can just picture ourselves living here also
I think it's a little more affordable as well I think so I haven't really looked into that but
possibly all that kind of helps and again when we say live here we are trying to figure out where we
might set up shop throughout the world and that might mean sometimes oh scooter coming no not
coming sometimes we might be living in a place for a month or two or way more like we did in
the Dominican Republic other times not yeah but we're just sort of making a mental checklist of
different places we could come back to and stay a while and this is definitely going to be on that
list yeah so if you're wondering yes we could live in this city for sure but I don't think
we could live in Palermo not quite sure I mean we could but this I definitely pick over that
so in the next video as you guys might know we've tried to sort of do some beach days and it hasn't
really worked out so we're going to a beach Town fingers crossed we can get some I love that you
said tried like it's it's been a fail so far so we're gonna try to do that we're gonna set up shop
in a little Beach town close by now if you're new around here it's Trevor and uh delightful
travelers thank you all for watching this fire in the video click subscribe leave us a comment pick
share the video probably means you like it if you got this far if you're not new we love that
you guys are watching again and big shout out to all of our patreons and our channel members
as well all right guys that's it from Catana wishing you delightful travels see you soon