Palermo is a fascinating place. Despite being the capital of Sicily, it was the last major city we visited on the island and for the first time in months it felt like we'd almost left Europe (and in many ways, we had!). The heat, the noise, the chaos - it sort of felt like we'd been transported across the Med to Cairo or Tunis. And then you see the buildings with their enormous mix of styles - Arabic, Norman, Byzantine, and later Italian as well. We had a fantastic day wandering around checking out the various sights, and were particularly impressed by the mosaics in the palace. I'm a huge fan of mosaic art and this was extremely impressive.