IT"A recommended place for those who know how to sit under an olive tree and wait."
The family-run hotel climbs up the side of a hill to reach its summit. From the property, you can overlook the southernmost tip of Sicily, a land steeped in ancient history since Syracuse was the queen of the Mediterranean.
The location offers peace of mind and a stimulus for body care, aimed at achieving wellness.
Often, when we walk among the trees of our countryside, a gentle breeze accompanies us and, slipping through the branches, produces a sound, the voice of the olive trees.
But what do the olive trees say?
They can say many things to those who listen to them. They speak to us about life and we listen to them. We treat them with respect, the same respect due to wise elders, because olive trees live longer than humans and are so tenacious that they can be reborn after suffering the aggression of fire. When we listen to the oldest ones, we know that their trunks contain the wisdom of those who have seen and known many generations of humans.
I often stop to listen to Hercules, an olive tree with a trunk so massive and strong that it seems indestructible. He often reminds me that life is a miracle, or rather, a series of miracles that repeat themselves every moment of our existence.
Just think of everything that makes our body move, that makes it act: muscles, bone structure, the autonomic nervous system, brain activity… we hardly notice it and think that everything is normal. We are no longer able to be amazed and are only astonished by the end of life, death, but not by its beginning and its unfolding.
‘Human beings think that there is no end to their existence.’
For thousands of years, perhaps since he became homo sapiens, man has always thought of himself as the centre of a system created to please him.
Few religions and/or philosophies have attempted to place them within a more complex mechanism, a small cog in a machine as enormous and complex as the universe. However, the more our knowledge of things deepens, the more our egocentric
pride diminishes in the face of evidence that we are not at the centre of anything, but rather part of something immense.
Only then does he realise how small he is.
Contrary to what some may think, this awareness does not demean him but sharpens his perception of belonging to something immense and produces a subtle sense of fulfilment.
The Street of Poems
The Street of Poems winds its way through the estate’s olive trees, a silent path where words and nature meet. Here we have collected and hung verses by well-known and lesser-known authors linked to Sicily by birth, inspiration or destiny. As you walk, your gaze rests on the poems moved by the wind, inviting you to slow down, read and listen to the intimate dialogue between the land and those who have described it.
Enjoy an authentic stay at our mindful retreat in Noto. Immersed in nature and designed to slow down.
We try to remain authentic and want to offer our services to our guests as if we were enjoying them ourselves.
