Friday evening: arrive and see the seafront lit

Get in, drop your bags near the centre — anywhere between the Cattedrale and Quattro Canti puts everything on foot. Head for the Foro Italico as the light goes: the city's seafront lawn fills at sunset, families and runners and kids with scooters, and the water turns the colour of the stone. Walk it toward the Cala, the old port, then turn up into the Cassaro: the Cattedrale floodlit, Quattro Canti glowing. Dinner in the Kalsa or around the Vucciria — nothing fancy needed, the street food is the point: arancine, panelle, a sfincione slice, cannoli filled to order.

Saturday: the whole Arab-Norman city

Morning: start at the Palazzo dei Normanni and Cappella Palatina (book ahead — the morning slot is the one) — the gold mosaics are the single most overwhelming interior in Sicily. Down the Cassaro to the Cattedrale: Norman towers, a Gothic portico, and the rooftop walk with the city spread below. Cross to Quattro Canti, the Baroque crossroads, then the two churches that face each other on Piazza Bellini — La Martorana and the red domes of San Cataldo — and Fontana Pretoria, the "fountain of shame," in the square next door.

Afternoon: lunch at Ballaro market — the biggest of the three historic markets, still a working morning market, and the stalls along Via Ballaro sell everything you'll eat today. Walk it off through the Capo and the San Giovanni degli Eremiti cloister (the red domes in a garden), then the Museo Archeologico Salinas or Palazzo Abatellis if you want one museum. Evening: the Teatro Massimo — even without a ticket, the evening tour is worth it; in season, book the opera. Dinner around Piazza Verdi, then the Vucciria after dark for the bar scene.

Sunday: Monreale, then the sea

Morning: bus or taxi up to Monreale, eight kilometres into the hills — the cathedral's 6,340 square metres of gold mosaics and the Benedictine cloister with its 228 carved columns are the other half of the Arab-Norman story. Two hours is plenty. Back down for lunch.

Afternoon, summer: Mondello — fifteen minutes by bus, a crescent of sand under Monte Pellegrino, the Liberty-style bathhouse on its pier. Swim, eat granita col caffè at a beach bar, watch the city do the same. Afternoon, winter: drive or taxi up Monte Pellegrino itself — the Santuario di Santa Rosalia in the rock face and the belvedere over the whole Conca d'Oro — then the Botanical Garden back in town before it closes. Evening: aperitivo on the Foro Italico, and you're done.

If you'd rather not rush

Drop Monreale and do Palermo slow: a second morning in the markets (Capo, which you skipped Saturday), a long lunch in the Kalsa, and the afternoon at the Abatellis or just sitting at the Cala watching the boats. Monreale keeps — Palermo rewards the lingerer. The itineraries guide has the slower versions of this plan.

Common questions

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