After the Palazzo dei Normanni, we crossed the Piazza Indipendenza and grabbed some street food for lunch. I think they were the tasty chick pea fritters, but I can't remember exactly. (Charles?) Then we took the bus out of Palermo and way up the hill to Monreale.
First stop: the cloister! Like the tiles at Normanni, each of these columns around the courtyard had a unique mosaic pattern.
There was a fountain in one corner of the courtyard, surrounded by additional columns with mosaics and a few very intricately carved marble columns.
The tops of all had very intricate carvings as well.
After visiting the cloister, we had lunch at a cafe on the plaza just outside.
Charles and Aldus took a little stroll while we waited for our food.
After lunch we went into the cathedral itself. It was spectacular in size and entirely covered in mosaics. The kicker? It was built in only ten years!
You can see in the first picture of the cathedral that there's a huge half-domed mosaic of Jesus at the front of the cathedral. The detail (and the quantity of gold leaf used) is amazing.
Other chapels in the cathedral had lots of inlaid marble of various colors.
After looking around the inside of the cathedral, we paid a few extra euros to climb the stairs. We walked out along the roofline overlooking the cloister.
I'm not sure why, but I really like this photo.
Along the walk we were treated to a spectacular view of Palermo way down on the coast.
We also got a closer look at the outside of the cathedral.
Aldus was not as impressed.
Of course after such an overload on our visual senses, we needed a break - and more pastries! Aldus considered trying to steal Charles's.
Mmmmm...pistachios and chocolate!
And I have to admit that I was defeated by this deceptive little almond pastry. It was so much denser and sweeter than I expected it to be, and I couldn't even finish it. So very tasty, and so very sad.
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