Etna

The one and only thing I didn't want to miss on our honeymoon was Etna. As you might already know I like mountains very much and I wasn't going to miss a chance to see the biggest active volcano in Europe.

We knew that it would be a long day so we woke up a bit earlier than usually and started driving through the mountains towards south. I had been too tired to search for a gas station the night before and we didn't have much left. I was concerned because of it but today the luck was on our side and we found a working gas station in a small mountain village not far from Piraino. Our plan was to search for traffic signs to the cities that fit our route. The plan seemed to work well and there was always another sign waiting for us when we faced a crossroad.

It's difficult to get bored with Sicily when the views are like this all the time.

Just like before we met a crossroad and there was a sign pointing left towards a city called Randazzo. The city was just what we had been looking for and we followed to sign. After a few kilometers the road started getting smaller and after ten it was already just a one-lane road with asphalt that looked at least thirty years old. I checked our map and realized that this can't be the normal road leading to Randazzo as it was supposed to be a big one. We didn't feel like giving up though and continued driving along the empty road in the middle of nowhere.

A short pause on a forgotten road through mountains

It goes without saying that the sceneries were astonishing and we enjoyed every minute of the drive, although we weren't really sure where we would end up. Eventually we arrived at the top of a mountain and even saw snow here and there. At this point the pavement was half gone and I had to drive about ten kilometers an hour. I really hoped this road would lead somewhere. A couple of hundred meters more and we met a crossroad that looked even worse. There was no pavement at all to the left and to right it was mostly gone too. We took the one that had at least some left and wow! Not long after that we hit the big road. It was still empty and silent but it looked like a highway after the roads we had just used :).

Snowman

On the higher mountains it actually looked a bit like winter.

The first view of Etna

A quick look at our map revealed our location and it was indeed clear that the small mountain road had not been marked in our map. Email me if you want to find the road as it is a pleasure to drive it :). It was from this small road where we saw the snowy hills of Etna for the first time and the view got better and better as we drove further towards Randazzo. We reached Randazzo around noon and walked in the center for a while. It felt like we couldn't have chosen the time of our visit better as there weren't any other tourists around and the weather was still warm enough for us. There are some really beautiful churches and old buildings in Randazzo and its location right next to Etna makes it very picturesque.

Randazzo and Etna behind it

In Randazzo

From Randazzo we continued driving towards Etna through the cities of Bronte and Adrano. In Adrano we noticed brown signs with "Etna" written on them and figured that it's the way we're supposed to take. Things started to feel familiar as we faced narrower and narrower roads with horrible if any pavement. We found a small entrance to the national park of Etna and drove in. We kept driving along the very tiny track paved with pieces of concrete. The road ended to a couple of gates and I wanted to continue for a while on foot but Inna refused. On the way back we took another road which ended in a hill which was too much for our small Lancia to handle. There was one more road which we hadn't tried so we drove there. Soon we found another one of those notorious brown Etna-signs and kept following. We found a small villa and another bigger entrance to the national park of Etna. We almost stopped there but we wanted to see if there's something even bigger a bit further.

Italy has problems with trash.

A rough lava scenery

Our gamble worked and quite soon we were standing next to the big tourist center of Etna south. I had read that the cable cars on Etna wouldn't work because of the last eruption but everything seemed to be in order. We took the cable car up for the horrible price of 27.5 euros per person and we had only ten minutes at the top because we were so late and they close everything so damned early. Etna didn't look nearly as spectacular there as it looks from a distance. When you are standing there on the hill it looks like a giant sandpit instead of a beautiful mountain. After seeing the way it looks and all the tourism surrounding it I'm almost glad that I didn't climb it :).

Etna couple

Sometimes Etna looked more like a mining zone than a mountain.

Inna posing with a crater.

On the way down we saw a really friendly fox who posed for many pictures. On both sides of the road one can see the old lava flows which are really beautiful in their own way. Before hitting the highway we visited a supermarket to buy some food. We bought a box of small fish and the taste was once again brutal. I spoiled one of my sandwiches with them and it was enough for me. We had bought some salami too and it at least tasted like real food should. Inna made me nice sandwiches while I was driving back to our hotel :).

This fox wasn't afraid of us at all.

Last look at Etna before driving down

Although Etna itself wasn't what I expected it to be, the day was really great. We saw some amazing sceneries and Etna was really beautiful from a distance. And it was the first volcano we've visited for both of us.

Piraino at night

The highway to our hotel