Whenever I read in the holiday brochures of quaint Mediterranean fishing villages - those very words, I swear - I am reduced to guffawing in my handkerchief. Quaint Mediterranean fishing villages ceased to exist with the demise of steamer trunk travel, Bakelite wireless sets and D H Lawrence.
It was with some pleasure, then, that I arrived in Cefalu, on the north Sicilian coast, and found quaintness, of a sort.
It was, admittedly, early in the summer, and the town had yet to receive the full brunt of Visigothic tourist hordes from northern Europe. What is more, Cefalu is protected from sackage by barbarian developers only by being squeezed on to the seaward side of a remarkable, towering coastal crag, la Rocca - elsewhere along these shores, there are dozens of resorts of the standard gimcrack modern variety.
Nonetheless, Cefalu, with its palpably Arab centre and grandiose Norman cathedral, has definite charm. But what took my fancy were the waterfront and beach themselves, both reminiscent of an intimate, small-town Italy plucked from a Rossellini film of the 1950s.
On the quay there actually were bright fishing boats bobbing about and nets drying on the flagged stones. Small brown boys took turns diving off the end of the quay into smooth, clear water pierced by shafts of sunlight. On the narrow strand beside the quay, where smaller fishing boats were pulled out of the water, young mothers took advantage of the shade to park sleeping babies.
On the long beach that began on the far side of Cefalu's old, tide-lapped houses, it was bikini beach-blanket time a la Siciliana. There was no immodesty among the groups of teenage town girls who lay sunning on the beach - Sicilian society is still some years behind the south of France. But the warm, sunny Saturday afternoon air was drenched with sexual innuendo - with their Vespas parked behind them, the local ragazzi were present en masse, hanging about the seaside promenade above the beach with their eyes sharply peeled for the main chance, or any chance at all.
Now, if all this sounds like a nostalgic idyll from a more tranquil and forgotten age, it was not. Have you ever heard the noise generated by scores of Vespas driven by passionate Latin swains on a ceaseless prowl for women? The narrow streets of Cefalu were deafening.
The tiny red Fiat 500 that spent the afternoon cruising up and down the Corso Ruggero blaring advertising messages from massive loudspeakers mounted on its roof was bad enough. But when I saw a Vespa driver threading his way through heavy traffic at high speed - and at the same time bellowing animatedly into a mobile telephone - I knew it was time to quit Cefalu for quieter, more peaceful pastures.
There is a miraculous thing about the Mediterranean - almost anywhere from Malaga to Izmir, no matter how hectic the coastline is, you have only to head a few minutes inland and the madness magically drops behind.
And so I wiggled my way inland along a winding road that rose into the hills behind la Rocca, and soon had Sicily to myself.
Still a bright springtime green, the slopes were dotted with bright red poppies and wildflowers. The further I went, the wilder and more rugged the countryside became. Yet it was gentle, too - in the valley bottoms, gnarled olive trees grew, and occasional small vineyards. Higher up were thick cork oak forests, their trunks, stripped smooth and bare of bark, a surprising chocolatey colour.
More surprising still were the small villages impossibly perched on the summits of high hills and knife-edge ridges. If it had not been for Arabs, Normans and a long list of other bloody-minded invaders of Sicily, no one in their right mind would have attempted building such villages.
Happily, though, the latest wave of invaders - we gelati and camera-wielding summer tourists - show little interest in the Sicilian hinterland. Which is just as well, I suppose, for if everyone dropped their plastic buckets and spades and swarmed inland, it would not long stay the glorious place it is.
Evening found me already long installed at the Villa Fiandaca, a century-old Sicilian country house outside the small farming town of Castellana Sicula. Here was blessed peace, indeed. Sitting and gazing out over the great bowl of surrounding hills that lies before the villa, all I could hear, in fact, were the cows in the neighbouring field. Each was equipped with a bell that clanged about its neck - for all that, I can assure you, Italian cows are quieter than Italian people.
If many years ago the Fiandaca family abandoned the hectic life of their native Palermo, they have kept with them all their Latin charm and hospitality; apart from looking after paddocks of sheep, hutches of rabbits and 300 olive trees, the Fiandacas also see to the welfare of northern urban refugees like me.
The antipasti that evening was superb, the peppers in oil, the sun-dried tomatoes, the pickled eggplant all lovingly home-made by Signora Fiandaca. So, too, was the vast meal that then followed. And over a walnut digestif, the recipe for which I am still badgering the Signora for, the Fiandacas explained why the area between Cefalu and Castellana remains among the most beautiful in Sicily - although dotted with villages and farms, the creation of the Madonie Park prohibits new development here.
I was interested in old development. Next morning I was up early and off to a perched village I had spied high across the valley.
Apart from cats sitting on sun-warmed walls, there was not a soul about as I climbed the cool, narrow stone streets of Petralia Soprana. From up here, some 3,000 feet above sea level, the view was limitless; without the heat-haze of midday I could see clear to the far, eastern end of the island, where Mount Etna sat smoking in quiet rumination.
But I did not have to look quite that far to please my eye; Petralia Soprana holds pleasures enough. Ambling down empty alleys and up steep stairways, I came across the arches, columns and bell towers of the 15th century Chiesa Madre. From here I discovered one church after another: the circular 17th century Chiesa Sante Salvatore, the baroque 18th century Chiesa San Giovanni, the lovely church of Santa Maria de Loreta, with its twin spires covered in multi-coloured ceramic tiles.
I was taken aback by it all, and as the Santa Maria's organ warmed up for the morning service, and the first whiskery old men took their daily place on the village piazza, I sat for a little quiet rumination myself.
Here was a perfectly preserved, immaculately kept medieval village. It contained not only impressive churches, but beautiful stone houses, ancient squares and breathtaking views as well.
Yet Petralia Soprana and nearby villages like it remain well off the tourist map; in my guide book, which devoted five pages to Cefalu, the place rated little more than five lines. Just as surprising, it also remains off the maps of mad young men on Vespas.
I scratched my head. It was quite unaccountable. Then I set off down the hill for breakfast, thinking as I went that there are surprises left in quaint old Europe yet.
Nicholas Woodsworth's stay in the Villa Fiandaca was organised by Sunvil Holidays, specialists in tailor-made Mediterranean travel, Upper Square, Old Islesworth, Middlesex TW7 7BJ. Tel: 0044 181-568 4499.