In those first years we explored the whole territory, from the sea to the Iblean highlands.
Back then, the coast looked very different from how we know it today. In several stretches, disorderly construction prevailed, and we didn’t find the same harmony we felt inland. That’s why we turned almost naturally toward the countryside, the farmhouses, and the small villages of the Val di Noto.
It was a choice born more from instinct than from the market. We felt that was where we wanted to work.
The great discovery of those years, though, was the Vendicari Nature Reserve. The first time we entered it, we fell silent. It wasn’t just a place of extraordinary beauty: it was an intact ecosystem, where the sea, the dunes, the ponds, the flamingos, and the Mediterranean scrub coexisted in a rare balance.
I understood right away that Vendicari wasn’t simply a nature reserve. It was one of the places capable of giving identity to the entire territory.
Those who chose to live in the Val di Noto weren’t just looking for a house. They were also looking for the chance to be close to a place that was still authentic, where nature had kept its own rhythm.
Year after year, something began to change. Our small office changed along with the town too. It was no longer just a real estate agency: it became a meeting place. People would stop by to say hello, someone would simply linger for a chat, the way you would at a café or a bar counter. Without realizing it, we were becoming part of Noto’s everyday life.
A few steps from the office was Caffè Sicilia, which became a small point of reference for us. Every so often, during breaks from work, we’d sit at the outdoor tables with Cica, have some gelato, and allow ourselves a few minutes to watch the town go by. Cica loved fior di latte and always waited for her small taste of it.
These are simple memories, but when I think back to our first years in Noto, they resurface alongside the bigger events. Because a new life isn’t built only through major decisions. It’s also built through small daily gestures that, over time, become memory.
Perhaps it was exactly this atmosphere that also captivated the first foreigners arriving in the Val di Noto. They didn’t just see a town. They felt they had found a place that still preserved its own soul.
And as I accompanied those people in discovering Noto, I realized that I too kept discovering it every day.
That’s when I truly began to understand that the value of a property never depends only on the house itself, but also on the landscape, on the life surrounding it, and on the deep bond with the land.