We are going to be here for a few days. Firstly because we want to spend the time but secondly because there are three imminent storms - one on each side of Sicily. Nowhere to go!
in general this is not a hardship. At the mooring, we roll a bit in the swell but George (who runs the field) helps us by adding a stern line to a second buoy. Still bumpy but quite tolerable.
Our first excursion is to Taormina town and to the smaller village of Castemola perched even higher up on the mountain above it.
The best way to go is to take two buses. The first goes up seemingly impossible hairpins/switchbacks to Taormina itself. The bus is a regular coach and going round the corners it takes up both sides of the road. I am sitting behind the driver and the front of the bus is about three inches from the stone wall that prevents us from plummeting back down the hill (the quick way) and into the ocean. There are about 15 or so of these turns; the driver remains calm and, at the bus station in Taormina, he drops us all off and gets ready to do it all again!
That was the main road…
Castelmola is a tiny village, much smaller than Taormina so it doesn’t merit a wide road. But it merits just as big a bus! Now we have serious bends that make those up to Taormina look like an expressway. Same calm demeanor of the driver; same complete competence and effectiveness under all circumstances. No shouting, gesticulating, insulting or cursing. Where are we again?
Starting at the top, Castemola was recommended because of its views and one of its restaurants. Castelmola is almost 1750 feet above the sea and, as the crow flies, it’s only a few miles from the coast.
The restaurant was suggested because of its food and the views of Mt. Etna the largest active volcano in Europe.
The menu looked excellent and the waiter reminded us each time we ordered a dish,
“You know that’s fish …”
“Yes”
“You know its raw…”
“Yes”
The food (Tuna Tagliata)
Lori's "Content" face
It was as delicious as we hoped it would be (never had raw shrimp before) and in the end he seemed pleased with us. There is, however, something slightly incongruous about eating the freshest fish imaginable so high up in the mountains.
It had been suggested that we might walk back down to Taormina from here. Right idea, wrong shoes. Calves ached the next day from trying not to slide down of the polished stone of the pathway. But it was great to be getting the exercise.
Taormina is one of the most elegant medieval towns in Sicily. In late May, it hosted the G7 Summit and that makes this the second time we have almost intersected with Donald Trump on this trip (the first being in Rome when we arrived). This whole thing had caused us much concern since we were not sure which of our Dolce and Gabbana outfits we should wear to show our empathy with the everyday Sicilian people.
The town (although it is described by one travel writer as “tourist-choked”) has some quite beautiful buildings and the throngs seemed to abate as the afternoon wore on and we could enjoy wandering around the narrow streets with some very high-end stores side-by-side with the usual vacation trinket shops.
We spent our second day on the boat riding out the bumps just in case something went wrong. It didn’t; we were snug and solid all day. This would have been a little boring but there was an air show right in the bay in which we were anchored.
It is surprisingly difficult to take pictures of an air show from a rolling boat. Well it's not really "that" surprising, but if anyone says my horizon's not straight ......
Since, we’d been looking at Etna for the past few days, we decided that the third day should be a tour of Etna. There are six of us in a little 4x4 that should really only hold four. Lori and I are in the back. Every time we go over a bump, our heads hit the roof of the car. Strategic slouching is the strategy from hereon.
Being a volcano, Etna is surrounded by lava fields (long cold) and our guide takes us to see one. Remember the road to Castelmola? For this episode we abandon the whole road concept entirely. Lava is very rocky, jagged and quite hard at times. The suspension in a lower-end SUV is barely up to the task. Strategic slouching employed extensively. The sheer scale of the lava fields is astonishing but after a while one patch of former molten lava starts to look much like another. But our guide is highly knowledgeable and fills in historical details, geological details and botanical details that add much color to the landscape. For example, Etna is the only active volcano that has a glacier. It is tiny and in a lava cave but it meets all the criteria for a glacier and, on top of all that, it is where the idea for granita (Italian water ice) came from.
It's cooler up here and can be a little windswept. Lori tries to get in tune with nature.
After a simple but thoroughly enjoyable lunch in one of the rifugios on the mountain we head off to see the Alcantara Gorges. The stone that they are made from is crystallized lava resulting in some of the regular patterns that you can see.
Strange and quite impressive. Equally impressive was the route to the Gorges. Not for us the highway that runs by the river. Oh no, we use the cart track. It is absurdly uneven with large rocks, unexpected dips and sharp drop-offs at the sides. The people in the front of the car laugh nervously; we employ strategic slouching yet again.
We wonder how many cars our driver goes through in a year but don’t like to ask.
Back at the boat, George has delivered the wine that we ordered yesterday (a great service - takes a lot of the heavy lifting out of boat provisioning) and we are ready to set off tomorrow for the Straits of Messina.