
This place reminds me of a song by Caetano Veloso: “Sun light (light of the sun),
may the leaf bring and translate in new green in leaf, in grace, in life, in force, in light. Blue sky …”
The song continues. My diary starts here, on the morning of September 15th 2014. It is the first time that I set foot in the Terre Sicane. I am here to take part in the harvest, to pick the grapes with the people who know this land well.
The vineyards belong to the Settesoli Winegrowers Association that includes some 7000 hectares and roughly 2000 small local winegrowers, all of whom are Sicilian.
This is what I see: a coalition of strong people that write a history of nature with their vineyards. I meet Francesco Di Carlo. In his hands he’s holding the equivalent of gold of these territories: Cataratto grapes. These are golden, native grapes, used to make one of the characteristic wines of Western Sicily, a fruit of the Terre Sicane, of this culture. It requires great dedication, and a lot of sweat. Dear Diary, history is made by a combination of nature and people, the people of these Terre Sicane.