Mazara del Vallo Publish (Part 2)

From our anchorage off Mazara del Vallo the town does not look terribly inviting and it was with some incredulity that we had read in our guidebook that, unlike other towns on this stretch of coast, ‘Mazara makes the most of its seaside location’. So, on the morning of Thursday 1 June, we went ashore to take a look. We took the dinghy into the harbour and tied up near one of the ‘marinas’. Seeing the water quality inside the harbour (better than at Sciacca but not that much better) we were pleased that the enormous jellyfish we had seen the previous evening had put us off taking an evening swim.

Having done the essential job (bought a full gas bottle) we were free to stroll around. The modern part of town is pretty grim and even the Centro Storico seems to be comprise more concrete-cancer riddled, ugly, square blocks than attractive architecture but, hidden away, in the maze of tiny alleyways there are a good number of Baroque churches and convents and piazzas around most corners. The whole of this area is paved with stone, worn smooth and shiny by years of use. Cars and scooters squeal round tight bends, less because of the speed but more because of their tyres scuffing on the stone. That’s not to say that the traffic moves slowly but at least in most of the alleys it can come from just one direction!

Our first stop was the Duomo, the town’s cathedral, which was originally built in Norman times but which was completely remodelled in the 17^th century. The relief over the door, showing Norman Count Roger trampling Saracens under the his horse’s hooves, is a 15^th century reminder that Count Roger freed this town, and all of Sicily, from Arab rule in about 1087.

BV anchored of the seafront parade   

The seafront parade, just in front of the Duomo, is a rather pleasant area, though the road seems very busy with traffic compared to the size of the town.

Further into the old town we found the church which, from our anchorage we had thought was a relatively modern, perhaps Gaudi-esque, building. Not a bit of it! The spires that had looked so modern from BV are in fact old spires and sculpture work all protected by wooden covers.

Despite Count Roger’s work 900-odd years ago, the North African influence is strong in Mazara. Apparently, Tunisians have been coming here for many years to work on the fishing boats and we saw plenty of Arabic writing on signs, shops specialising in Tunisian food, tagines for sale and cous cous dishes available in restaurants.

Bottarga masterclass at Antico Borgo Marinaro. Top left – Marmoreo; Top centre – the wine; Top right – jar of bottarga (what we had expected). Bottom left – restaurant Antico Borgo Marinaro; Bottom centre – our tutor (picture from restaurant advertising); Bottom right – ‘proper’ tuna bottarga   

This part of Sicily used to be a big tuna fishing area. Bottarga (in Italy, the roe of tuna or swordfish, though elsewhere it is the roe of grey mullet) is a Sicilian speciality and we were trying to get hold of a jar, having last had it when we passed through Sardinia and western Sicily in 2014. We found an Italian corner shop and asked if they had any. The staff had no English but we wrote down ‘bottarga’ and, after a certain amount of discussion between the lady who was serving, the owner and his friends, we were told that we should go to “Marmoreo”. Happily, given our lack of Italian, one of the gentlemen took pity on us and, rather than try to give us directions he set off on his scooter with us trailing behind at a fast walk. We stopped first at a fish packing shed where we were shown what looked to be a tuna steak, vacuum packed and frozen. This wasn’t what we were expecting and we clearly looked puzzled, so ‘Mr Scooter’ buzzed off along the riverside road with us trying to keep up. We thought we had lost him but he had turned into a square parking area, next to which is the restaurant Antico Borgo Marinaro. ‘Mr Scooter’ and the restaurant’s owner/chef are clearly acquaintances, if not friends, and the latter treated us to a masterclass in bottarga.

The dried jar of roe that we had been expecting to buy does not feature in his definition of bottarga. Instead we were shown 2 large vacuum-packed slabs, about 30cm x 10cm x 5cm, one of fresh tuna bottarga and one of swordfish bottarga. Our bottarga tutor opened both and very thinly sliced a small amount of each, presenting them on a plate with some bread and olive oil. We were invited to try them on the bread, with and without the oil, first the swordfish bottarga and then the tuna roe. Being the bottarga innocents that we were, we had not expected such a huge taste difference between the two! In comparison to the swordfish bottarga, the tuna bottarga is less grainy, much less salty and has a far smoother, almost more mature, flavour. It certainly warrants being twice the price of the swordfish bottarga. Having tasted, and learned lots about, the bottarga, we were offered a small glass of a local wine to complement it.

So, after a wonderful and totally unexpected bottarga masterclass, we departed Antico Borgo Marinaro having bought a small amount of the tuna bottarga, carefully vacuum packed, and withour tutor’s instructions ringing in our ears – ‘always slice the bottarga very thinly, eat it with a little bread and good olive oil…….and don’t grate it!’.

The Dancing Satyr of Mazara Del Vallo   

Before reading our guidebook about Mazara del Vallo, we had had no idea that the town housed a Hellenistic bronze statue (a rarity given that most ancient bronzework has been smelted down over the millennia to make useful things such as weapons!). The main body of the statue was recovered from the seabed on 4 March 1996, by a trawling fishing boat operating from Mazara, the same fishing boat that had, the previous year, dragged up the statue’s left leg. Indeed, in a film about the statue, the captain of the boat said that having recovered the leg, he often took the boat back to the same area in the hope that he might recover the rest of the statue. After significant, painstaking restoration work (the film showed restorers working with tiny scrapers to remove the seabed encrustations and cotton buds for cleaning with liquids) an inner frame was built into the statue so that it can be displayed upright. It was over 5 years before it was ready for display but, after a short time on display in Rome (close to where the restoration work was carried out) it was returned to Mazara del Vallo.

The satyr is incredibly well-preserved despite having spent millennia in the sea and the loss of its arms, one leg and its tail (separately cast, as evidenced by its fixing hole at the base of the statue’s spine) almost makes no difference. The film suggested that the sculptor imagined the satyr to be dancing a bit like a whirling dervish – arms outstretched, back arched, in a leaping, almost on-the-spot spin, and it is easy to see that in the ‘swing’ of the statue’s hair. It really is quite an incredible object to find at such a small, out of the way town. It would not have surprised me to have been told that the original is in the major Italian archaeological museum and that this were a copy, but it is fantastic for Mazara del Vallo that the town houses the original and, I guess, one day may house some more of it too, assuming that the fishing boat is still trawling the same area!

Also housed in the same museum, a building that was previously the Church of Sant’Egidio, are a number of other artefacts dredged up in the channel between Sicily and Tunisia. These include the ubiquitous amphorae and, more importantly, 2 books of calfskin or goatskin sheets which had been destined for use as velum or a similar ‘paper’ before the trading ship that had been carrying them sank. Quite how these survived so long under water (I think about 450 years) without biodegrading we do not know – the only signs about them were in Italian.

So, after an unexpectedly fascinating visit to a town that we had not planned to visit, we turned our sights westward again. Marsala would be a short motor but we had our fingers crossed for some wind – after all BV is supposed to be a sailing yacht, not a motor yacht!

Mazara Del Vallo, Sicily, Italy