Italy
Agrigento
Greek temples lit gold at night along a ridge, almond blossoms carpeting the valley below.
Doric temples line a ridge above almond and olive groves, their honeyed columns warm against the evening sky. After dark, floodlights turn the Temple of Concordia into a golden apparition floating over the Sicilian plain. In February the valley froths white and pink with blossom.
Agrigento's Valley of the Temples preserves the sacred ridge of Akragas, in its day one of the wealthiest cities of the Greek world; Pindar called it the finest of mortal cities. Its temples went up through the fifth century BC, and the Temple of Concordia stands nearly complete because the sixth century turned it into a church rather than a quarry. Below the ridge, the Kolymbethra garden has been restored to working citrus and olive terraces, and the archaeological museum shelters a giant reassembled telamon that once helped hold up the Temple of Zeus. Evening tickets put you among the floodlit columns after the coaches leave.
Solo
Walk the ridge at opening time while the valley is still cool; few solitary cultural hours in Italy match it.
Couple
Take the evening ticket for the floodlit columns, then dinner overlooking the ridge; ancient grandeur, genuine intimacy.
Family
The open-air scale lets children roam, and full-size temples hold attention in ways cabinets of pottery never will.
- The Temple of Concordia survives nearly whole because the sixth century made it a church.
- The Valley of the Temples sells evening tickets; after dark the ridge glows gold against black.
- Pindar called Akragas the finest of mortal cities, and the ridge still argues his case.
- Every February the almond bloom fills the valley floor beneath the columns.
Pasta con le sarde balances sardines, wild fennel, saffron, sultanas and pine nuts, the island's sweet-savoury signature.
Cassata layers sponge, sweet ricotta, marzipan and candied fruit into edible Baroque.
El Brujo
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