I awoke refreshed and went down for breakfast.  We were underway at 9:15 for our last day in the field.  We drove along the coast for about an hour and a half to the ruins of Selinunte known as Selina.  The site is enormous but has been in ruins since antiquity.  Fifteen temples are sited here.  A few have been restored to various degrees.  Much of the site appears to have been destroyed during an earthquake.  Many of the columns lie parallel to each other, both inside and outside of the temples.  It would be fun to get aerial photos of the site and generate a rose diagram of column orientations.  Some columns do lie at odd angles so they may have been toppled by Christians or Roman rednecks on a Saturday night.

We drove down to the beach and ate at a nice restaurant overlooking the Mediterranean.  It was a great buffet with calamari salad followed by spaghetti with a shellfish sauce.  Afterward, we descended the stairs to the beach where most of the students went swimming in the cold water. 

In the afternoon, we continue northward to Segesta where a marvelous 6 x 14 column temple, exhibiting upward curvature, stands in its full glory.  It is intact and unrestored but also, apparently, never finished.  It stood at the westernmost point of Greek domination. It is fitting that the Brevard domination of Sicily should end here. The quarry from which the stones were cut is a deep at behind the temple.

The drive to Palermo took about another hour.  The city is much bigger than I imagined, about 1.2 million. We drove to the Albergo Anthenaeum, a hotel near the center of the old city but about 45 minutes from the airport.  It is set on a narrow quiet street about 50m off of the main road. Francesca is from Palermo so she said good-bye to us and headed for her home. I got a nice room.  Because it was already 8:00 when we arrived, I postponed showering until after dinner.  About a dozen of us walked a block and a half to a great little pizzaria.  I had calzone and a beer.  Everyone ate very well. 

We returned to the hotel rather exhausted and said good night.  I stopped by Elise and Laura’s room and talked with them and Dave for a while before going to my room and doing some packing for tomorrow’s 5:00 am departure from the hotel.  Joan called at about 11:00 and we talked about our imminent reunion tomorrow evening.  I then showered and went to bed around midnight.

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