I took some time before writing about Madrid because I needed to tone down the excitement a notch. Because travelling is so subjective and if I wrote this the minute I got back home I'm pretty sure it would have been all in caps and lots of exclamation points haha. But seriously, I never visited one city which made me feel so at home before this trip. It has everything I ever wanted: glorious art museums, my favorite football team in the world (spoiler alert : the next post will be exclusively about this), clean streets, magnificient arhitecture, amazing history (I basically wanted to move in the Royal Palace!), great shopping and INCREDIBLE PEOPLE! I will make a comparison to Paris, because it's always been the city of my dreams. When I visited Paris, it had all the things I previously mentioned (minus the Real Madrid team) but somehow I felt a sort of unease. I mean, it wasn't so safe to walk on the main boulevards at night (not the case for Madrid!), everything was more expensive and people were polite, but in Spain they're so loving and helpful! It's like they have a 6th sense for tourists who need help. I was sceptical at first because I never encountered such an hospitality in a big city, maybe we were blessed with this incredible experience because we stayed in the lovely neighborhood of Lavapies.

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you must know how much I love Andy Warhol.  Although Andy may have taken his art lightly at times, famously saying "art is what you can get away with" I disagree with anyone who thinks what Andy did was not art. In my opinion, he is the father of the most fun & joyful art to watch: POP ART. My personality is a paradox, I admit: I can read for months books of history and stare in front of a Botticelli paintings for hours, but there is also a side of me who reads Mindy Kaling's crazy funny books and won't leave the sketches section Andy made for Vogue & so many fashion brands over the years! I don't get people who say you can be only into one type of culture/art. Pop art history is so fascinating, there are so many commercials which Andy invented and which are still going strong today and I bet you have no idea, I'm a fan and I just learned about the Absolut sketch on my trip to Madrid. Somehow, luck follows me when I visit a city: it's the third time I went somewhere and I found a pop-up Andy Warhol exhibition! This one in Madrid is really ground-breaking, with over 300 works of Andy, so much history and massive gift shop with all Andy Warhol things inspired (good thing I had my bff Simona with me and she only let me buy the small souvenirs, otherwise I'm pretty sure I would have spent most of my money on day one!). You can find it until May at Caixa Forum Madrid. I was so impressed with the fact they recreated one of Andy's project which people aren't really familiar with: CLOUDS. Andy made this from the NASA fabrics, in an era when everyone was obsessed with silver because it represented space and our hopes for the future. It's shocking how you can enter a room and just play with giant clouds, no they don't feel like helium balloons, you just want to move there, you could see everyone with a giant smile on their faces as they entered the room!

After this whole incredible experience, we visited the Prado museum. I loved it so so much, Velazquez is a genius, I'm so happy I got to see so many of his works, the famous "Las Meninas" is so moving, we just didn't want to leave its side. Also, the Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymous Bosch left me speechless. I recommend visiting the Prado museum before the Royal Palace like we did because the museum is full of paintings of all the royals of Spain and when you get to the Royal Palace you'll be like "I know them all! I know their history! This king was painted by Velazquez". After that, we took a stroll and we ended up in front of this iconic Metropolis building and then enjoyed the exctiment on Gran Via because it was match night- Real Madrid was playing against PSG in UCL. It was one of my biggest dream to see the match on the Bernabeu but we couldn't afford the tickets. Still, watching the match in Madrid is a whole different experience than at home- the whole city freezes, everyone is so focused & you should hear the noise&joy when the team scores. They won 3-1 and it was a perfect way to end our first night in Madrid!

“The idea is not to live forever, it is to create something that will.” 

― Andy Warhol

Our second day in Sicily was a full one! My uncle made this genius schedule- one full day when we would arrive at the hotel late at night, always followed by a lighter day when we'd arrive at the hotel at 5 PM and have some time for the pool ( I still miss the pool so much, it was the best!).

We started with the historical Syracusa. I'm sure you've heard about Syracuse from Ancient Greek tales, and it is also the birth town of Archimedes, the brilliant mathematician. The amazing part about Syracuse is that it has an astonishing archaeological Park (it's an UNESCO heritage site) where you can see the Ancient ruins - you can't imagine how big it actually is, and it was particularly hard for us to visit it because we went to Syracuse on our hottest day in Sicily and at some point when we ran out of water I was getting kind of dizzy. Thank God for my straw hat, I don't know what I would have done without it in Sicily! I loved the Greek and Roman theatre in Syracuse but I was most impressed by the Ear of Dionysius (photos after the break)- it's an unique cave, I was amazed about its shape and size.

The old town of Syracuse is called Ortigia and to me it was like a totally different town, tourists usually say it's the most magical part of Syracuse and I agree! The residents of Syracuse usually take their passeggiata in Ortigia and who wouldn't, considering the fact there is a breathtaking Piazza del Duomo (I couldn't stop taking photos of the Duomo, it's an exemple of brilliant architecture) ,the Fountain of Arethusa and some unique views over the sea. I also ate the best Nutella ice cream in Ortigia- ever since I came home from Sicily I couldn't bring myself to buy Nutella ice cream because I'd rather remember that taste!

After Ortigia, we went to a beautiful town called Noto - it resembled with Ortigia, especially the style of the churces but it had a certain air, I could walk for days on its cobbled streets! I also had my first cannoli in Noto and I have to say I prefer a ricotta cannoli over a chocolate or vanilla one, to my surprise. But what left me speechless was how lucky we were- there was a pop-up exhibition in Noto of one of my favorite artists -ANDY WARHOL (Andy Warhol e Noto- il barocco immaginario) . Three years ago I started to be really into pop art and I read a lot about his work, but what ultimately made me a fan of Andy Warhol the man, artist part aside, was the book he wrote - The Philosophy of Andy Warhol. I was a teenager, and you know how certain books shape your future adulthood? This book was it for me! It was so profound yet written in a light way, with a genius sense of humour. I was like a kid in the candy store, I couldn't stop looking of Andy's sketches dedicated to the legendary Cecil Beaton, that Mick Jagger Interview cover, the Velvet Underground cover and all Marilyns and Campbell soups! I honestly never wanted to leave the exhibition, having so many of his famous works in one place made me ecstatic!

I usually mix photos up in travelling posts, but I chose to place them cronologically this time, so I could write notes on what can you see in each town.