SICILY SEPTEMBER 2025

The pilot triumphantly announced that our flight plan was taking us over Bognor, which I suppose is indeed on the way to Sicily. Over Switzerland where the Alps look great, if somewhat snowless, and down the coast of Italy to Catania. Immigration takes two minutes, followed by 45 minutes in a cab just to leave the airport, due to roadworks and Friday traffic. With two motorways rock solid, we eventually find another way round Etna and up the coast to Milazzo port. This route takes us past Etna, which Shaunagh and I have been up before (the largest volcano in Europe), and Taormina, where we have previously visited the Greek Amphitheatre in 2017. In Milazzo we stay at the Itaca Loft Rooms as a pitstop before boarding the ferry in the morning.

It’s a Saturday so it’s packed with day trippers. The first stop is Vulcano, the name that started it all, then Lipari, the largest of the Aeolian Islands, and after a change of ferry we arrive in our first island destination, Salina. Salina has two chunky peaks which we circumnavigate on a 15-minute cab ride to the Signum Hotel in Malfa, where the terrace provides superb views of two other volcanic islands: the perfectly conical Stromboli and the sliced off Panarea. As well as being in the Aeolian Sea, we are in the Southern Tyrrhenian Sea. This is a highly fertile marine environment which serves as a breeding ground for sperm whales, bluefin tuna and dolphins, as well as hosting a range of habitats including seagrass meadows, coral reefs, submerged caves and grottos. As the sun sets, we watch balls of red lava rolling down the side of Stromboli out at sea. The following morning we take a fairly robust hike up the peak above Malfa and the sea is billiard table flat with another idyllic clear view out to the majestic Stromboli.

Having developed a penchant for the fantastic local orange wine made by the vineyard a stone’s throw away (Barbanacoli), it is obligatory to down some of it pre- or post-sunset whilst staring at the volcanoes across the water – something one can never tire of. With the hotel’s prices fairly lumpy, we stroll up into town to Trattoria A Quadara for a basic but tasty meal at a fraction of the price. Intensive swimming in the charming pool follows the next morning, with the added incentive of completing your lengths by aiming straight for Stromboli in the distance. Then a similar out-of-hotel strategy for lunch in the town opposite the church at Bar Malvasia, where I experience Messina beer with sea salt crystals for the first time, and a perfectly pleasant bowl of carbonara adorned by a couple of mussels that I didn’t order. The highlight of our evening is our evening trip in a 15-minute taxi ride to the west coast town of Pollara, with a specific objective of watching the sunset. This is at a charming hotel/restaurant called Locanda del Postino set in a rocky cove, where we marvel at the orange changing sky set against two of the smallest of the group’s islands, Filicudi and Alicudi. Lovely.

Next we are off to Panarea, a 25-minute ferry ride. This helps us complete our picture of the seven islands. The shape of Panarea is much clearer from the far side and of course brings us closer to Stromboli. The whole set are the result of over 260,000 years of volcanic activity, apparently. The Cincotta Hotel is perfectly fine but somewhat out of season with no restaurant, but the views from all sides are excellent. We walk for a one-hour return trip to a restaurant that doesn’t seem to exist, before returning to the main town for dinner. Stromboli produces a welcome puff of smoke and as the sun sets there is a red glow on the far side.

The next day our challenge is to climb the mountain, and we opt for a pretty much full circuit of the island going clockwise. This involves a robust 1,200 foot climb to start with with, levelling out to some great views at the top, where we encounter a pair of falcons on their favourite lookout point. Stromboli puffs again as the weather changes. We have been hearing thunder out to sea and now comes the rain – warm and actually quite welcome as we complete our three-and-a-half-mile hike in 2 hours and 40 minutes. We round off the day with dinner in a rather strange restaurant called Ristorante Da Giovanna which is part of the Hotel Oasi. This involves a somewhat curious trek behind the hotel to arrive in a high level garden where a series of poseurs show off about how much they can pay for dinner. The toilets turn out to be in the garden, behind a tree and down something akin to a lift shaft leading underground. Rather odd.

With two days left we check the weather and today is the hotter of the two so we decree it an International Day of Leisure and spend it mainly by the pool, rounding off with a relatively functional pizza at Albergo. Happily the day after is indeed a little cooler and more cloudy, which fits perfectly with our plan to climb Stromboli. The 9am ferry gets us there in 40 minutes with a fast stop at the tiny town of Ginostra, before rounding the island and arriving at the base for our trek. Everything works brilliantly. We find the trail head with ease and begin our ascent up through surprisingly green landscape dotted with lava flows and huge amounts of bamboo. Our Trails app suggested we could go up to 400 metres without a guide but the signs here say 300 metres, at which point we wonder whether this will allow us to see the dramatic scar face. We needn’t have worried and a new trail just below the 300 metre line actually gets us there quicker. On the way we encounter a few goats, a hoopoe, various falcons and buzzards, and a large black snake, along with a series of dramatic warning signs explaining what to do in the event of Paroxysmal explosion hazards, unpredictable high energy explosions, and even tsunamis. There is no one around, so we have fantastic viewing all to ourselves. The crater makes a series of puffing and rumbling noises, and every 5-10 minutes a new burst of smoke emerges, sometimes with hot rocks that tumble down the slope, steaming as they go and dropping into the sea. We complete the 5.3 mile round trip in two hours and 40 minutes, by which time my boots have effectively walked their last and will need to be retired.

Returning to Panarea we require significant showering to wash the dirt off ourselves before well-earned drinks and dinner. Dinner is at a rather bizarre place called Da Pina, which you might have thought could have a pine theme, but instead the décor was 100% dedicated to lemons, which were present in every form – real ones on the table, painted tiles on the tables, glazed arrangements and placemats everywhere, cushions, menus – everything. A yellow assault on the senses indeed.

The following day the weather has turned and it rains most of the time – perhaps a timely reminder that autumn in the Aeolian Islands has indeed begun.  The timing is pretty much perfect for us on our last day where admin and packing is the order of the morning before leaving on the 4.15 ferry back to Milazzo via Lipari and Vulcano where we see for the last time fumaroles emanating from the peak that overlooks the harbour. Our cabbie speeds us down the Sicilian motorway that is a marvel of engineering as it bores its way through mountain after mountain before we arrive at the final step of our trip – a lovely rustic B&B at the foot of Etna called La Casa di Pippinitto. It offers no catering so we venture into the nearest town where we eat at La Bisteccona – a traditional trattoria in Santa Venerina. We walk back in 20 minutes and spend a while evicting the 3-inch centipedes that have scuttled into our rooms before retiring for the night. After a suitably rustic breakfast we are off to Catania airport and heading back to blighty.

Closing remarks on the Aeolian Islands and Sicily. Catania airport, the surrounding motorways and huge port are messy and crowded, with the motorways only coming into their own when free of the city and heading to Milazzo.  The Liberty Lines ferry system is excellent – reliable and reasonably priced, offering an efficient way to see multiple islands. Of the 7 islands, we saw all of them. The two smallest, Alicudi and Filicudi, were nicely framed as a sunset. We stayed on two (Salina and Panarea), and climbed three volcanoes, including the outstanding Stromboli. It is worth remembering that this is island life, which has interesting effects on food and prices. Some accommodation is very expensive, as is even some of the most basic food. It is not uncommon for eateries to have no salad, for example. The majority of most menus is fish, with the occasional meat offering and no chicken. Wine is an oddity, with local wines frequently priced at 30 Euros a bottle even if made next door.  This changes when returning to Sicily, with local Etna wine arriving for 7 Euros. These small points aside, the crowning glory is of course the volcanoes. Highly recommended: 9 out of 10.