Sure, I'd be glad to continue:

I chose to travel last year in late June/early July, and despite it being
a little bit warm, this was a great time to go. Actually, it seems like
almost any time is good to be in Sicily -- aside from late July or August
when it must be positively scorching. The island gets a lot of warm, but
refreshingly dry air from Africa, and it's not a terribly uncomfortable
heat. Bring hats...

I also landed in Catania -- courtesy Lufthansa, which has a very nice
service from Munich a few times a week. The airport there is amazing, and
you should let it become part of your whole experience right away. It's
definitely not amazing in the technologically advanced sense, but amazing
in the sense of overflowing with activity, people, and above all, chaos.
This was the best part about flying in to Sicily from Northern Europe.
One minute, you're on an cold, efficient, air-conditioned jet, and the
next minute you step out onto the hot jetway, into the terminal where you
get to dive right into Sicilian culture. As you walk out of the customs
area, you'll see extended families who've come to greet their relatives,
making noise and gesturing (this is what Sicily is all about!), hordes of
children running around, workmen jackhammering up the floor as they do
renovations in the middle of the day -- in short, the place yells out
"alive".

Change some money at the small airport bank for your first out of pocket
expenses. They have ok rates, but what I would recommend in general is
that you use your ATM card to get Italian currency -- they DO have ATMs,
and you get good exchange rates. Unless you're in the heart of Sicily in
some podunk town, there's an ATM nearby. Remember this is Sicily, so you
can find out, as I did, that the bus ticket booth isn't open after lunch
until something like 2pm. Buses in Sicily (and Italy in general) are not
like here -- you have to buy your ticket before you get on, and then punch
it in the little box. So the ticket vendor is on his lunch break, yet the
buses keep on running! If your flight arrives around lunch time and you
decide to take the bus into Catania, you'll have to wait until the guy
comes back...

What I did was to use this time to call and find a hotel. I decided to
take the train down to Siracusa for the first night, and because this was
a last minute decision, I hadn't booked any place to stay -- but this is
generally not a problem. Finding rooms in Sicily is not a big challenge,
aside from in Palermo perhaps. In general, though, I found that calling
one day ahead is enough time to have a good choice of places to stay. My
guidebook for the trip was Let's Go, which was probably as acceptable as
most of the others -- it served to anchor my prices to a reasonable level,
and covered the main routes and sights well.

So anyway, I got into Catania after an hour or so, and I was surprised
during the short bus ride how modern everything is -- relative to what I
had expected. I thought I would be landing in some charming rural cliche,
but make no mistake, Catania is an industrial town. While most of Sicily
is agricultural, Catania certainly is not. I didn't stay long in Catania
-- went right to the train station, ATM, and bought my ticket to Siracusa.
The train stations all over the island can be pretty spectacular in
themselves. Since the trains run along the coast, even at the stations
you can get amazing views of the deep blue Mediterranean water.

I stayed in Siracusa one night, and immediately became socialized into the
nightly routine of walking around the square/waterfront/parks after
dinner. A reminder -- dinner in Italy is taken much later than here or
northern Europe, and I got used to it qu ickly. The meal goes more
leisurely, and afterwards you join in with everyone strolling around town.
I don't know what kind of zoning rules they have in Italy, but I found
that every block is a self-contained unit with shops and residential
apartments a nd restaurants, which produces communities where people stay
up late and actually talk to one another after dark -- very unlike
suburbian America, where everyone just goes (or drives) home.

Don't pay attention to the stories you hear about mafiosi, etc. I found
the Sicilians to be exceptionally friendly and sociable. I should tell
you that I don't look anything like a Sicilian, and I found people talking
to me like an old friend. The key may have been learning some passable
Italian, so that I could communicate back at least -- this helped a great
deal. At one point, after telling a Sicilian grandmother type that I had
grown up in New York, she gave me a tour of her entire neighborhood, t
elling me about all her relatives on Long Island the whole time. What a
great place to be.

So, I spent a night and a day in Siracusa, where the main touristy
attraction are the Greek ruins. I almost left without seeing them, and
it's a good thing that I didn't. The Greeks certainly knew how to choose
where to build cities, temples, and amphit heaters, because they generally
overlook spectacular views and have great natural beauty. I won't go on
about the ruins here -- you can read about them in a guidebook, but be
sure to see them.

Will continue with more as time allows...