Palermo, Monreale, Mondello and Ustica

How to read Palermo

Palermo is Sicily's largest city and a place of deliberate contrasts: damaged facades and elegant baroque palazzi, Byzantine gold beside Arab-influenced domes, noisy markets next to cloisters and gardens, and new creative spaces inside buildings that once seemed beyond repair. Phoenicians founded the settlement on a sheltered bay almost 3000 years ago, the Arabs conquered it in 831 CE, and Norman rule began in 1072. Roger I made the city the seat of a tolerant kingdom in which Arabs, Byzantines, Greeks and Italians continued to live and work together. That layered history is still visible in the food, languages, crafts, street art and architecture.

The historic centre is large but manageable on foot. Via Maqueda and Via Vittorio Emanuele meet at Quattro Canti and divide the old city into Albergheria and Ballarò, Il Capo, La Kalsa and Vucciria. The four quarters feel different: Albergheria is a market and monument district, Il Capo is the central street-food quarter, La Kalsa mixes galleries with the sea, and Vucciria is the old market-and-nightlife zone. North of the centre, neoclassical and Liberty buildings lead towards Parco della Favorita, Mondello and the hills of Monreale. Near the waterfront, the marble Buca della Salvezza marks the escape of two anti-Bourbon patriots in 1860, when women staged a street fight to distract soldiers outside a medieval hospice.

A three-day frame

1. 01Day one: see Palazzo dei Normanni and Cappella Palatina, eat your way through Ballarò, then cross Piazza Bellini and continue along Via Maqueda and Via Vittorio Emanuele. Finish at Fontana Pretoria with a rooftop aperitivo.
2. 02Day two: visit the cathedral and its roof, learn the city's Mafia history at the No Mafia Memorial, tour Teatro Massimo, and see the puppets and collections around Palazzo Branciforte. End around Piazza San Francesco d'Assisi or Via Alessandro Paternostro.
3. 03Day three: take the bus to Monreale and stop at Catacombe dei Cappuccini on the way back. In La Kalsa, choose Galleria Regionale Palazzo Abatellis, Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Orto Botanico and the ruined Chiesa di Santa Maria dello Spasimo, then dine by the new Molo Trapezoidale marina.

Allow extra time for the things that give Palermo its character: a breakfast espresso with a ricotta-filled cannolo or cream-filled iris, a market lunch, a look inside a courtyard, live jazz in a roofless church, a visit to a maiolica collection, and an evening passeggiata. Street food to seek out includes panelle, crocchè, arancini, quaglie, scaccie, sfincione and pani câ mèusa. A short trip to Mondello supplies a beach day, while Ustica adds volcanic coast, diving, lentils, capers and farm produce.

Albergheria and Ballarò

Albergheria and Ballarò combine UNESCO-era monuments with unfiltered street life. Arab traders established the market tradition here in the 9th century, and the quarter still mixes Sicilian, African and Asian aromas. Coppersmiths on Via Calderai, African hairdressers on Via del Ponticello, immigrant-run food businesses and new creative projects sit beside churches and palazzi. The area was poor and ramshackle after the Second World War, yet its workshops, food and art are now among the most revealing ways to understand present-day Palermo.

Quattro Canti and the Sun Theatre

Quattro Canti is the formal centre of the old city, where Via Maqueda meets Via Vittorio Emanuele. Giulio Lasso designed the four matching 17th-century facades in a late-Renaissance Roman style. Each corner is arranged in Doric, Ionic and Composite levels, with statues representing the seasons, Spanish rulers and female saints of Palermo. Return at different hours: sunlight illuminates one facade while the others seem to dissolve into the blue sky. Street preachers, musicians, horse carriages, Piaggio Ape taxis, orange-juice carts and €5 Aperol spritz beakers turn the intersection into a busy open-air theatre.

Ballarò market and its bold flavours

Mercato di Ballarò is a long, noisy ribbon of stalls and open-fronted shops selling produce, fish, olives, spices, household goods and clothing. Follow Via Ballarò beneath parasols and corrugated awnings, then look for the whale mural by Messina-born artist Nicolò Amato, who signs marine paintings as NessuNettuno. The market opens into a different kind of spectacle at Chiesa del Carmine Maggiore, where the cupola has stucco atlantes and Carmelite-coloured majolica. Admission is €5 for adults and €4 for children, or €7/6 including the bell tower. A guided visit or an occasional August evening opening gives the best dome view.

Chiesa del Gesù di Casa Professa, five minutes away on Via del Ponticello, is the baroque counterpoint to the market's rough edges. Its Pietro Novelli frescoes and ornate interior cost €6 for adults, with children admitted free. Back in the market, Via Giovanni Grasso and Via Giovanni Naso are good places for shaved granite, sfincione, grilled octopus and the grilled-intestine snack stigghiola. Look for the flaming grill at Bancarella Del Polpottavio. Ballarò staples include Antichi Sapori di Ballarò, Bancarella Del Polpottavio, Cotto e Bollito and Da Mimì di Guglielmo Damiano, where the listed hours are 7.10am to 10pm and an arancino is the natural comparison with the market version.

Stigghiola and other market food

Stigghiola looks like a sausage but is usually veal, lamb or goat intestine wrapped around spring onion or leek, seasoned with parsley and grilled over a street barbecue. It is chopped, salted and served with lime. Other Palermo market bites include panelle, chickpea fritters; crocchè, potato croquettes that may contain mint; quaglie, fried aubergines; arancini; scaccie, filled rolled dough; and sfincione, a soft slab traditionally topped with tomato, onion and caciocavallo. In Palermo, sfincione is not simply pizza, and the distinction matters to locals.

A slow-design walk on Via Vittorio Emanuele

• ✦Angela Tripi displays small terracotta presepi in a 15th-century palazzo courtyard at Via Vittorio Emanuele 452.
• ✦Naná Aristova, at number 314, makes contemporary jewellery inspired by Sicily's volcanoes. The studio is listed at nana-aristova.com.
• ✦Spazio a Tempo, number 297, uses traditional majolica and images of monuments in paper craft, homeware and jewellery.
• ✦Barbisio, number 286, is a hat shop dating from 1949 and a good place to look for the Sicilian còppola flat cap.
• ✦Sicilia Inspired, number 292, sells modern art that includes drawings made with Etna lava pigments.

Piazza Bellini, Santa Caterina and nearby drinks

Piazza Bellini is a useful pause between monuments. Real Teatro Bellini has the square's only cafe terrace, while Casa Stagnitta has roasted coffee, milkshakes, granita and parfaits and has been roasting since 1922. Its listed hours are 6am to 6pm Monday to Saturday. Pasticceria Costa serves coffee and sweets from 8.30am to midnight, with shorter winter hours. St'orto is a relaxed option for coffee, craft beer and cocktails, open 9.30am to 2am Friday to Sunday and from 5.30pm to 1am Tuesday to Thursday.

Chiesa e Monastero di Santa Caterina d'Alessandria is an early 14th-century hospice turned convent, occupied by nuns until 2014. The church costs €8 for adults and is free under seven; the rooftop supplement makes the adult/child total €10/free. Allow two hours for the Renaissance and baroque interiors, Vito D'Anna's 1751 dome, Filippo Randazzo's 1744 vault fresco, marble inlays, gold leaf and the amethyst-and-lapis tabernacle. The majolica cloister has balconied cells and an 18th-century fountain by Ignazio Marabitti. Finish with a €3 cake or cannolo at I Segreti del Chiostro.

The convent bakery follows the liturgical calendar: marzipan lambs and cassata at Easter, frutti di martorana on All Saints' Day on 2 November, sfince di San Giuseppe on 19 March, and panini di Santa Caterina on 24 November. The pastry tradition has passed between generations of nuns for more than 800 years. For a late drink, Altrove Bar serves Italian craft beer and cocktails from 10am to 1am Friday to Sunday and 6pm to 2am Tuesday to Thursday from March to October. Moltivolti combines co-working, a cafe, world food including vegan dishes and a bar until midnight. Tatum Art hosts intimate jazz from 7pm to 1am Tuesday to Saturday, with summer concerts moving to Mondello. Al Fresco serves drinks in a walled banana, palm and plumeria garden from 6.30pm to midnight Wednesday to Sunday.

Royal gardens and Norman Palermo

Chiesa di San Giovanni degli Eremiti is a calm escape behind its walls. The 12th-century church is named for the hermit-monk William of Montervergine, and its garden combines olive, fig, pomegranate and citrus trees with cloister ruins. Admission is €7 for adults and free for children. Nearby, Palazzo Alliata di Villafranca looks neglected outside but preserves aristocratic interiors from 1752 to 1758. Guided tours run 10.30am to 5.30pm Friday to Monday and cost €15/10. They show stained glass, Serpotta stucco, majolica floors and gilded leather in the smoking room. Tours are in Italian, with English commentary through a QR code, and Giuseppe Garibaldi rested here before the three-day Siege of Palermo in 1860. Across the street, Cappadonia Gelati is known for salted peanut and bacio di dama.

Palazzo dei Normanni and Cappella Palatina

Palazzo dei Normanni began as a defensive fortress built by the Arabs in the 9th century and became a royal pleasure palace under Roger II. It remains the seat of the Sicilian Regional Assembly. An allocated time slot is essential from June to September; adult and child admission is listed at €19/11. From the Maqueda courtyard, the royal apartments lead to the Hall of Viceroys, the Hall of Mosaics and the square Tower of the Winds. The Royal Apartments are open Friday to Monday, and a €5 audioguide is available in the bookshop. A scarf is required because shorts, short skirts and bare shoulders are not permitted in the chapel.

Cappella Palatina was decorated by Byzantine Greek craftsmen from 1130. Its mosaics narrate Christ, the saints, prophets and evangelists in the presbytery, show Christ Pantocrator in the apse and dome, and continue through the Old Testament in the nave. The painted wooden ceiling is a rare Mediterranean example of 12th-century Fatimid art. The palace gardens offer shade beneath California fan palms, South African blood flowers and orange bird-of-paradise plants, with classical music playing from speakers in the flower beds and the Giardini Café at the end.

• ✦Caffè del Kassaro is a cheap cafe and restaurant, listed from 7.30am to 3.30pm Monday to Saturday.
• ✦Al Fresco has a walled garden, drinks and zero-kilometre cooking from 6.30pm to midnight Wednesday to Sunday.
• ✦Antica Foccaceria ni Piddu Messina sells pani câ mèusa at the corner of Via Amedeo and Via Ossuna, 7am to 8.30pm Monday to Saturday.
• ✦Ai Normanni serves classic Sicilian food in a courtyard near the palace, noon to 3.15pm and 7pm to 10pm Tuesday to Saturday.

Il Capo and the central city

Il Capo was a market and trading quarter under Arab rule, once associated with pirates and slave traders. Its market streets remain tough and colourful, while the cathedral and Teatro Massimo bring a very different scale of history and ceremony. Piazza Giuseppe Verdi is the transport hub. Chiosco Ribaudo sells AMAT tickets, and official taxis wait near the cathedral on Via Vittorio Emanuele. Sicily Infopoint, at Via Vittorio Emanuele 351, offers luggage storage, bicycle rental at €10/15 for a half or full day, and sunset walks, cycling tours and boat excursions. Late-night cathedral openings in August often run on Saturdays from 8.30pm to midnight.

The Via Maqueda passeggiata

Via Maqueda is Palermo's everyday catwalk, with shops, hawkers, cheap jewellery, fake-majolica flat caps and €3 beakers of fresh pomegranate juice. At Biga (bigageniofarina.it) the dough is naturally leavened for 48 hours and a slice costs €3.50. The porchetta delle Madonie pizza combines Madonie pork, smoked scamorza and sweet Giarratana onions. Ke Palle (kepalle.it) sells arancini for €3.50 to €4, including swordfish, aubergine and mint. Cannoli & Co (cannolieco.it) lists cannoli at €3 and also serves cassata and granite. Donnafranca (donnafrancalab.it) makes arancini at €3.50 to €5, including Nutella or pistachio cream fillings, alongside cornetti, bomboloni, ciambella and ricotta-filled iris.

Cattedrale di Palermo

Palermo cathedral is a monumental Arab-Norman building begun in 1184 on the site of a 9th-century mosque. A column on the southern porch still carries a passage from the Koran. Antonio Gambara's 15th-century three-arched portico is a Catalan Gothic highlight, while Ferdinando Fuga's dome, added from 1781 to 1801, is more controversial. General admission is €12/6 for adults/children. The combined cathedral and Diocesan Museum ticket is €15/8 and covers the tombs, crypt, apse, treasury, roof and 15th- to 18th-century art. Buy in the archbishop's palace or online to avoid queues, and check for summer roof openings until midnight.

Inside, royal Norman tombs hold Roger II, Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, Henry VI and William II. The treasury preserves a tooth and ashes associated with Palermo's patron saint, Santa Rosalia. The roof is reached by 110 steep stone steps and gives the city's clearest sunset panorama. Nearby, the No Mafia Memorial uses photographs, newspaper cuttings and multimedia material to explain Mafia and anti-Mafia history. Admission is by donation and two hours is a realistic minimum. Its history reaches back to 15th-century feudal lords who employed bravos to steal livestock and 16th-century extortion in the markets.

Il Capo food and cocktails

• ✦Trattoria Rosa Nero offers inexpensive traditional food, 1pm to 3.30pm Monday to Saturday and 8pm to 11pm Thursday to Saturday.
• ✦Le Angeliche is a Slow Food trattoria near the market, open 6pm to midnight Tuesday to Sunday.
• ✦L'Acerba is an osteria dinamica for creative Sicilian dishes, Sunday brunch, cocktails and live music, noon to 3pm and 6pm to 11pm Tuesday to Sunday.
• ✦A'Cuncuma, led by Gianfilippo Gatto, offers modern tasting menus from 7.30pm to 11pm Monday to Saturday.
• ✦Mak Mixology pairs drinks with modern food in a 1930s arcade off Via Maqueda 301, 6pm to 1.30am.
• ✦Malox Cult serves a house Negroni with Bulldog gin, Cinzano 1757 and Bèrto Bitter from 5.30pm to 2am.
• ✦SciùRum is a cocktail lounge and pizzeria open noon to 2am, while Terzo Tempo Cocktail Lab focuses on signature drinks and boutique spirits from 6pm to 1am or 2am Wednesday to Monday.

A backstreet market walk

Use Porta Calini as the northern entrance to Mercato del Capo. Follow Via Porta Carini for lemons, coconut, wild strawberries and skewered snacks, then turn along Via Sant'Agostino beneath fabric awnings. Chiesa di Sant'Agostino has a plain 13th-century facade, a cloister and Serpotta stucco. At Piazza degli Aragonesi, the 2022 Muro della Legalità honours 26 people killed in Sicily's anti-Mafia struggle. Via Carrettieri carries the colourful stencil work of Marco Mirabile, known as Tutto e Niente, as well as politically charged murals by Zolta and Ema Jons. On Via Gioeni, workshops at numbers 1, 7 and 9 make kitchen tools, do carpentry and upholstery. Museo del Carretto at number 4 is the home workshop of fifth-generation cart maker Franco Bertolino. Finish at Mercato delle Pulci on Piazza Domenico Peranni, where around 20 stalls sell books, dolls, gramophones, glassware, jewellery and religious kitsch, and collector Luciano Ienna shows a cabinet of curiosities from the 18th century to the 1970s.

Teatro Massimo, art and sweets

Teatro Massimo was built between 1875 and 1897 to designs by Ernesto Basile and is Europe's third-largest opera house. A guided tour costs €12 for adults and €6 below age 26. Tours enter the six-tier auditorium, the 27-seat royal box, the Echo Room and the roof terrace. Cocktail and concert tours are listed at €45/80. If the September to June opera season is not running, the building is still worth seeing. Palazzo Riso, at Via Vittorio Emanuele 365, houses the Museo Regionale d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea della Sicilia. The permanent and temporary programme includes Jannis Kounellis installations, and admission is €7/3.50; the museum shop features Sicilian designers. For a colder snack, a Palermo grattatella is €2: hand-shaved ice scraped from a half-metre block and flavoured with lemon, mint, banana, tropical rose, orgeat or even Coca Cola.

Frutta martorana is almond-rich marzipan shaped and painted as figs, oranges, lemons, pomegranates and pears. Nuns at La Martorana are traditionally credited with creating it for a royal visit, and it was once associated with All Souls' Day in November. Today it is sold year-round. The best-known theatre of traditional Sicilian puppetry is Opera dei Pupi di Mimmo Cuticchio, at Via Bara all'Olivella 95. Performances are listed at 6.30pm Saturday and Sunday from September to June and cost €10/5. Across the street, the workshop shows how Giacomo Cuticchio makes Saracen warriors, sorcerers, monsters, knights and princesses from beech, olive or lemon wood. Palazzo Branciforte (palazzobranciforte.it) displays the family puppet collection for €9/7 Thursday to Sunday, with Friday to Sunday opening from November to March.

Vucciria and the Loggia

Vucciria, also called the Loggia, was the quarter of Pisan, Amalfitan and eastern merchants and later of craft guilds. Modern Mercato della Vucciria on Piazza Caracciolo is much smaller than the market painted by Renato Guttuso in 1974, but the area still comes alive after dark. Dyers, silversmiths and doll makers left their names to Via dei Tintori, Via degli Argentieri and Via dei Bambinai. Walk rather than drive: most of the narrow streets around Piazza Caracciolo are pedestrian. Streaty (streaty.com) runs food-market walks, while Prestia e Comandè (prestiaecomande.it) connects the centre with Falcone-Borsellino airport from the La Rinascente stop in about 45 minutes. Tickets are listed at €6/4 one way and €10/8 return. Il Bar, inside La Rinascente on Via Roma, is one of the rare places to see the quarter from a rooftop.

Puppets, Serpotta and the market at night

At the market, look for Rocky Basile's mobile cart selling pani câ mèusa near Via Vittorio Emanuele 215. Al Tentacolo serves boiled octopus and fried fish at plastic tables from 11am to midnight Tuesday to Saturday. Ciwara, an African lounge bar on the square, adds food, drinks and music from 1pm to 5am Tuesday to Sunday. The Tesori della Loggia church group preserves Giacomo Serpotta's late-baroque stucco: Oratorio di Santa Cita, with a Battle of Lepanto scene, charges €4/3, while Oratorio del Rosario di San Domenico is free. Serpotta lived from 1656 to 1732, developed a marble-like polish for stucco and placed expressive figures asymmetrically to heighten the sense of movement. Palermo's rod-marionette tradition arrived with the Spanish in the 18th century, staging Charlemagne, Orlando and Rinaldo as stories of love, treachery, justice and oppression.

• ✦Buatta Cucina Popolana serves sweetbreads and ricotta ravioli with offal from 7.30pm to 10.30pm.
• ✦Trattoria Ferro di Cavallo has operated since 1944 and is open noon to 3pm and 6.30pm to 11pm Wednesday to Saturday, with shorter Monday and Tuesday service.
• ✦Aja Mola offers seafood on a terrace, 12.30pm to 3pm and 7.30pm to 11pm Tuesday to Sunday, plus Monday service.
• ✦Doba is one of Palermo's few rooftop restaurants, serving refined Italian food.
• ✦Deca Bistrot, Brama Cocktail & Cucina, Ferramenta and Maison Bocum cover the late-night range from mural-facing bistro to cocktail, wine and private-club-style rooms. Maison Bocum is open 6.30pm to 1.30am Wednesday to Saturday and Monday, with an additional Sunday lunch and evening service.
• ✦Basile - Focacceria del Massimo serves value Sicilian food near the opera house, while Il Bar offers salads and Timeloop cocktails on La Rinascente's four terraces. Osteria Pantellaria lists an all-you-can-eat aperitivo banquet at €20, and Forna Santa Maria pairs creative pizza with mixology.

Museo Salinas and Palermo's ancient world

The Museo Archeologico Regionale Antonio Salinas occupies a Renaissance monastery and arranges Greek and Roman finds around three courtyards. Adult and child admission is €7/3.50. Highlights include 5th-century BCE Phoenician sarcophagi, the reconstructed pediment of Temple C at Selinunte, Greek carvings from Himera, the Bronze Ram of Syracuse, Etruscan mirrors and the world's largest collection of ancient anchors. The courtyard gardens, turtles and glass-roofed central court make this one of Palermo's best heat-proof museums.

The world of the Sicilian aristocracy

Gagini is Palermo's Michelin-starred address; gaginirestaurant.com lists the restaurant in the former Renaissance workshop and mansion of sculptor Antonello Gagini. Chef Mauricio Zillo builds menus around Palermo sumac, Nubia garlic, Mediterranean lobster, yellow Monreale plums, Ispica sesame and caper flowers from Salina. The three-, six- and eight-course menus are listed at €90/110/130, and reservations are essential. For a literary history walk, Sicilia Letteraria's Parco Tomasi connects Via Lampedusa, Piazza San Domenico and Via Butera, places associated with the city's aristocratic novels and palaces. Palazzo Mirto, a 17th-century residence of the Filangeri family for four centuries, costs €8/4 and is filled with silk, velvet, Cordovan leather, frescoes, stucco, majolica and mosaics. Its Chinese Salon and the swivelling Apollo statue concealing a passage are highlights; check before going because technical closures occur.

La Kalsa: art, sea and alternative Palermo

La Kalsa runs from the historic centre to the sea and the new marina. Abandoned palazzi and bomb-damaged streets now sit beside galleries, bars, restaurants and ambitious street art. The neighbourhood contains Galleria Regionale della Sicilia, Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Palazzo Butera, Chiesa di Santa Maria dello Spasimo, Orto Botanico, Foro Italico, La Cala, Mura delle Cattive and Molo Trapezoidale. From Palermo Centrale it is about five minutes on foot to Piazza Magione. AMAT bus 107 links the port with the station for €1.40, and hydrofoils and ferries leave the port north of La Cala.

Modern art, workshops and Serpotta

Galleria d'Arte Moderna charges €10/8 and occupies a 15th-century palazzo that later became a Franciscan convent. Its collection spans the late 19th and 20th centuries and includes Francesco Lojacono, Palermo's so-called Sun Thief, whose paintings made Sicilian light a subject in its own right. Piazza Aragona is the Artisans' Square: Junkle sells homeware from discarded sails, InsimuLab makes jewellery, and Elena e Fabrizio works with leather. NewArt108 and Ojdå provide coffee and food on the square. At Oratorio di San Lorenzo, Serpotta's €3/2 stucco scenes of St Francis and St Lawrence fill the late 16th-century oratory; it is closed on Mondays.

Street food and Piazza San Francesco

Palermo's buffitieri tradition covers quick snacks prepared and eaten at the stall: pistachio sardines, marinated swordfish, quarume, panelle, crocchè, quaglie, arancini, scaccie and sfincione. At Piazza San Francesco d'Assisi, Antica Focacceria San Francesco has been serving focaccia con la milza, arancini, pane panelle e cazzilli and trattoria dishes since 1834. The Romanesque church facade, cobbles, independent boutiques and street art make the square a natural dinner setting. For the city's signature spleen bun, Francu U Vastiddaru near Piazza Marina stays open daily until 2am and lists panini at €3-6. Ask for maritata if you want ricotta or caciocavallo with the boiled and lard-fried spleen, lung and trachea, rather than the schietta version. Pane Câ Meusa - Porta Carbone also lists €3-6 buns; eat them under the 150-year-old ficus in Giardino Garibaldi or beside the boats at La Cala. Ojdå offers imaginative vegetarian food and vintage interiors, Bisso Bistrot has a popular brunch service, Osteria Ballarò combines local sashimi, cheese, salumi and wine, and Tè Co serves all-day brunch, tea and vegan cake.

Majolica, the waterfront and the sea

Stanze al Genio is a B&B in a 16th-century palazzo on Via Giuseppe Garibaldi and the private home of collector Pio Mellina. The collection contains about 2300 Sicilian and Neapolitan majolica tiles from the 16th century to the early 20th century, and guest tours take about two hours. Other craft stops include La Sagomina's brass, nickel and silver jewellery, Edizioni Precarie's paper work, Desadorna's botanical jewellery, Rogato's recycled bags and La Cittàcotte di Vincenzo Vizzari's terracotta miniatures of Palermo monuments. At the port, Seica Boat offers coastal trips, sunset aperitivi and party boats, including trips to Mondello.

Molo Trapezoidale is Palermo Marina Yachting, opened in late 2023 around the ruins of Castello a Mare as part of a billion-euro waterfront project. The site has berths for yachts over 80m, a landscaped park, conference centre, Gambero Rosso Food Wine Academy, artificial lake and a fountain with hourly sound-and-light shows. The jets rise as high as 20m and are paired with projections and video. Bruno Ribaldi Club focuses on craft beer, City Sea serves breakfast through dinner from 9am to midnight, Morettino Coffee Lab runs to 11pm or 1am Friday and Saturday, and Pasticceria Costa serves almond, pistachio and ricotta sweets from 9am to midnight.

Palazzo Abatellis, Mura delle Cattive and the gardens

Galleria Regionale Palazzo Abatellis occupies the 1490 mansion of harbour master Francesco Abatellis and Eleonora Soler. Admission is €9/4.50. Its famous works include the anonymous monumental Trionfo della morte and Antonello da Messina's L'Annunciata. Foro Italico is a grassy seafront park south of La Cala. The elevated Mura delle Cattive was built for mourning widows to walk above the old city walls, and the free 5km Foro Italico parkrun loops three times on Saturday morning. Coffee at Le Cattive and Palazzo Butera, with adult/child admission of €11.50/9, make a good follow-up. Orto Botanico costs €7/4 and combines Mediterranean, tropical and subtropical plants with endangered Sicilian species and a do-it-yourself birdwatching trail.

Jazz and dinner in La Kalsa

Chiesa di Santa Maria dello Spasimo is a roofless 16th-century church used as Palermo's most atmospheric open-air venue. The Ridotto dello Spasimo-Blue Brass Jazz Club, with the resident Sicilian Jazz Orchestra and Brass Group Music School, runs its main concert season from July to September. The Sicilia Jazz Festival lists tickets from €15, and Teatro di Verdura adds summer jazz outside the centre. For dinner, Ciccio in Pentola focuses on fish and seafood, Salina offers contemporary seafood, Osteria dei Vespri occupies the palazzo used for a famous film ball scene, and Le Cattive pairs Tasca d'Almerita wines with sea views from the Mura delle Cattive. Their listed service includes 10am to 12.30am Wednesday to Saturday and to 9pm Tuesday.

Monreale, Mondello and Ustica

The easiest escapes from Palermo are very different from one another. Monreale is a hilltop Arab-Norman masterpiece, Mondello is the city's classic beach resort, and Ustica is a volcanic island where boats, diving, farms and walking trails dictate the day. Organised excursions are available, but AMAT buses make Monreale and Mondello straightforward to visit independently. City Sightseeing (city-sightseeing.it/en/palermo) and Panoramic Palermo Tour (palermopanoramictour.com) also stop at both towns.

Monreale's cathedral of gold

Take AMAT bus 389 from Piazza Indipendenza to Monreale: the ride is about 30 minutes and costs €1.40. The UNESCO-listed Cattedrale di Monreale stands 8km southwest of Palermo, charges €4/2 and is open 9am to 12.30pm and 2pm to 4.40pm Monday to Saturday, and 2pm to 4.30pm Sunday. Inside, the mosaics finished in 1184 show Noah's ark, Rebecca watering camels, Christ healing a leper, the murder of Abel, Adam and Eve, and dozens of other biblical scenes. A €1.50 brochure maps all 42 scenes. The rooftop gives aerial views of the cloister, majolica roofs and Palermo and the sea. The cloister, entered from Piazza Guglielmo II, costs €7/3.50 and stays open 9am to 6.30pm; look for William II offering the cathedral to the Madonna.

Catacombe dei Cappuccini and other Monreale stops

On the way back towards Palermo, stop at Catacombe dei Cappuccini, 1.2km west of Piazza Indipendenza or at the Calatafimi Pindemonte bus stop. Admission is €5 and the site closes for lunch from 12.15pm to 3pm. The 16th-century tufa tunnels contain around 2000 mummified or skeletal Palermitans from the 17th to 19th centuries, arranged by status, gender, family and profession. The last burial was the two-year-old Rosalia Lombardo in 1920, preserved by Palermo's leading embalmer. In Monreale, Il Gelato della Piazzetta serves almond, liquorice and cinnamon flavours; La Bodeguita dei Sapori makes focacce and bruschette; Vintage Bistrò has a terrace with Palermo and sea views; and Ciambra combines seafood with croccante di mandorle, ricotta and pistachio mousse.

Mondello beach and Villa Zito

In summer, AMAT bus 806 leaves Piazza Crispi for Mondello in about 30 minutes for €1.40, with the service listed at roughly ten-minute intervals. A boat from La Cala is another option. The former malaria-ridden port became fashionable after 19th-century aristocrats built villas, and the Liberty-style pier and baths dating from 1913 now contain Alle Terrazze, a restaurant with a raw seafood bar and sea views. On the way back, Pinacoteca Villa Zito costs €6 and closes Monday and Tuesday. The 18th-century villa holds mainly Sicilian art from the 17th to 20th centuries, including Etna eruptions, Favignana tuna fishing, Liberty painter Ettore De Maria Bergler, futurist Pippo Rizzo and Francesco Lojacono's seascapes. Buy tickets online.

Food around Mondello

• ✦Pasticceria Saimone is the seafront stop for blueberry granita, cannoli and pistachio gelato cones, 7am to 7pm Tuesday to Sunday.
• ✦Sebastian serves pizza, burgers and several lobster dishes from noon to 4pm and 7pm to midnight on a rooftop over Mondello beach.
• ✦Poldo 2 combines burgers, sushi, pasta and seafood beside the beach tower built in 1455 to defend the tuna fishery, noon to 3.30pm and 7pm to 11pm.
• ✦Bye Bye Blues is led by Patrizia Benedetto, Sicily's first female Michelin-starred chef, with seasonal tasting menus from 7.30pm to 10.30pm Tuesday to Friday and lunch plus dinner at weekends.

Goat farms south of Palermo

Between Belmonte Mezzagno and Altofonte, goats graze on mountain pasture and small farms turn raw milk into cheese and ricotta. Naturalist guide Marco Giordano (facebook.com/MarcoGiordanoGuidaNaturalistica) leads slow walks and farm visits. At Azienda Agricola Balzo Rosso (facebook.com/formaggidicapraepecorabalzorosso), visits are listed from 6am to 9am Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. The young owner Marta Spera makes organic cheese from unpasteurised milk and fills cannoli with her own ricotta.

Ustica by hydrofoil and on foot

Ustica is about 90 minutes from Palermo's ferry port by hydrofoil. The volcanic island lies inside a marine reserve created by local fishers to protect their waters and marine life. Dolphins and sea turtles may appear near the grotto-lined coast, and May to October is the main diving and snorkelling season. Orca Diving and Evasion Blu Diving rent equipment and organise beginner dives and lessons near the port. Rent e-bikes, scooters or boats from Da Gaetano above the harbour.

From Cala Santa Maria, follow Sentiero del Mezzogiorno for about 6km west to the lighthouse at Punta Cavazzi. The trail passes hibiscus, prickly pears, red volcanic-stone walls and stairways to rocky swimming spots, with signs towards Grotta 'Za Azzurra and other caves. Ustica's farms produce olives, almonds, pomegranates, capers and sweet Zibibbo Muscat grapes, but the signature crop is the small, firm brown lentil. At Piscina Naturale, rough volcanic rock forms a natural swimming pool. Five minutes farther, Il Faro Solarium rents loungers and parasols for €15 to €25 per day and has a small snack bar.

Ustica brown lentils have Slow Food Presidium status. At Agriturismo Hibiscus, 1.8km west of the port, an organic farm and small museum explain how plants are sown with horse-drawn ploughs in December, dried in the field and harvested by hand when leaves yellow in June. The Pistata delle lenticchie separates the lentils from the straw. Specialità di Maria Cristina sells island preserves and lentils from 8am to 1pm Monday to Saturday. For food, Gelateria Sabrina has served island gelato since 1931, Trattoria Da Umberto cooks the morning catch and lentil soup, Carruba serves creative dinners from 8pm to 11pm Tuesday to Sunday, and La Rosa dei Venti is the yacht-club choice for sunset music and dancing.

Santa Rosalia and Palermo's calendar

Palermo's patron saint Santa Rosalia is celebrated on 14 July during the Festino di Santa Rosalia, when her relics travel from Palazzo dei Normanni towards the waterfront on a triumphal chariot followed by fireworks and street festivities. On 3 September, after dark, people make a traditional 4km torchlit pilgrimage up Monte Pellegrino to the Santuario di Santa Rosalia, built into the cave where the noble-born Rosalia lived and where her bones were found. The chapel dates from 1629 and pilgrims continue arriving on 4 September.