A Walking Tour of Sicily by Mary Novakovich
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Mario Puzo has a lot to answer for. I’d had enough of people saying to me “So did you get an offer you couldn’t refuse?” at the mention of a visit to Sicily. Out came the usual jokes of horses’ heads and sleeping fishes. But I did get an offer I couldn’t refuse: an unusual way of seeing what the Mediterranean’s largest island had to offer a walking and food enthusiast who was almost as in the dark as her Godfather-obsessed friends.
The plan was to combine independent walking in more remote parts of the north-western side of the island with a more traditional guided tour of the region around Sicily’s biggest landmark, Mount Etna.
The First Stop
Our first stop, Scopello, was just over the next headland from Palermo airport, on the Golfo di Castellemmare. It’s more a hamlet than a village, with a handful of cafés and restaurants with terraces looking out over the Tyrrhenian Sea. As it was one of Italy’s many public holidays, people were thronging Scopello’s medieval baglio – a fortified courtyard now with filled with shops and restaurants – making it look like a particularly lively film set.
The baglio principle was applied to our own hotel, the Tenuta Plaia agriturismo, which sits a couple of hundred metres outside Scopello, facing the sea. It’s only two years old, but it already has a claim to fame: Brad Pitt stayed here while filming Ocean’s Twelve. More impressive, however, was the warm welcome offered by the owner, Cinzia, and her restaurant manager who guided us through our first Sicilian dinner.
The antipasti showed what magic can be created by a caring chef: octopus, caponata (fried aubergines and artichokes), frittata of broad beans and more artichokes. The choice of pasta dish (tagliatelli with cuttlefish ink or ravioli with pistachio sauce) looked too tasty to narrow down, so we had a bit of both. And then came mixed grilled meat. It was a top-class introduction to Sicilian cuisine.
Nature Reserve
The first chance to walk off the big meal came the next morning with a 12km trek through the neighbouring Riserva dello Zingaro. This nature reserve is the first in Italy, and came about only when plans were afoot to build a motorway through this stretch of coastline. The locals reacted in typical Italian fashion: they went on strike until the plans were dropped. It was the right decision, of course, as the 1,600-hectare reserve is a haven for birds such as Bonelli’s eagles and peregrine falcons.
After a 30-minute climb of several hundred metres along a stony, meandering path you reach one of the many peaks that reward you with captivating views of the sea and the many coves tucked into the coastline. One of the coves made an attractive spot for our lunch of panini we bought from a café in Scopello.
Leaving the Mainland
It seemed as if we had barely arrived in Sicily that we were leaving “the mainland” for a couple of days in Marettimo, the westernmost island of the Egadi archipelago, an hour’s hydrofoil journey from the coastal town of Trapani. Fulvio was waiting for us with a golf cart. “I’ll take the bags and you walk to the residence,” he said. “You can’t miss it.” His little joke, we gathered. Marettimo has one village, one road and only a few dozen families. The island’s only hotel (well, self-catering residence, really) was clearly visible from the other side of the tiny harbour.
It was as if we had arrived in a Tunisian toytown. As Marettimo is closer to Africa than it is to mainland Europe, it was appropriate to see two-storey white houses with blue shutters and doors lining the quayside. The Marettimo Residence re-creates the local style, with clusters of white houses with private terraces flanked by trellises covered with bougainvillaea. We surveyed the well-equipped kitchen and immediately went shopping. You don’t turn down the chance to do some self-catering in Italy – not with the quality of tomatoes, cheese and olives on offer in the local shop.
The village of Marettimo sits on the island’s sunny eastern side, the only inhabited part of the island. The rest consists of peaks as high as 680m, forests and footpaths of varying difficulty. As we discovered later, we made the first-time visitor’s classic mistake of assuming that a coastal walk to an abandoned castle at Punta Troia wouldn’t take more than an hour. Wrong. Although it was worth the effort in the end, we hadn’t been quite prepared for the three-hour walk on a path that was precipitous in places as it hugged the side of the cliff.
Off on a Walk
We were better prepared for the next day’s walk. A stone path made its steep way just behind the village straight up to the Roman ruins that make up Case Romane, and a Byzantine chapel, whose domed interior was covered in graffiti in defiance of the sign imploring visitors not to write on the walls.
Another path then led through an enchanting forest of Aleppo pines and on hillsides smothered with prickly pear and bright blankets of valerian and calendula. After an hour or so, we reached a forest rangers’ stone hut at Carcaredda. From there it was an extremely rocky and crumbling road down to Plaia Nacchi, an inviting cove that required a walk along a path that was barely a foot wide with a sheer drop to the sea.
We had seen hardly a soul, except for an old gent who approached us just as we were starting our walk. “You must be the journalist visiting us,” he smiled at me. “I’ve got a boat if you want a tour of the island.” I thanked him for his kindness, but explained we were off on a walk. No problem, he beamed. Buona giornata!
The Pace of the Island
That evening, Fausto, the owner of our residence, invited all of his guests to join him for dinner in the communal dining room. Spit-roasted suckling pig, he announced proudly. It turned into a very convivial evening, the flowing wine enhancing our wonderfully relaxed mood. Not that relaxing is hard to do in Marettimo. The pace of the island dictates that everything slows down, from the time it takes to knock back your espresso to the time spent chatting to shop owners about the food you’re buying.
Time to return to the modern world.
Dragged like the lotus-eating members of Ulysses’ crew we got back on the hydrofoil and were driven to Palermo to catch the coach to Catania on the other side of Sicily. If you want a jolting return to reality, spend an hour in a Palermo traffic jam (missing your coach in the process). But a two-and-a-half hour ride through the hinterland of Sicily soon restored our equilibrium. Sicily is one big volcanic outcrop, covered mostly in mountainous landscapes that are more dramatic than even the wildest British moor.
Destination: Etna
It was going get even more spectacular, with Etna as our destination. It’s Europe’s largest active volcano, clearly visible from the window of our room at Case Perrotta, our agriturismo in the foothills in Sant’Alfio. There we joined a party of 12 British walkers with Headwater Holidays who were led by our delightful guide Elena, a bubbly 30-year-old from Taormina. They were beginning a gentler itinerary than the one we’d just left. That meant visiting Etna by minibus, cable car, then another, tougher minibus to reach almost 3,000m from sea level.
Yes, it was easier, but walking up Etna without some winter gear (which we hadn’t brought) would have been foolhardy. The air was bitterly cold and snow was still on the ground – a surreal sight on the black lava that was still warm, even hot, in places. Sulphur mingled with the clouds that swirled around us as we walked around the crater. Initially I thought that the clouds obscuring the view would make the trip less enthralling, but I hadn’t reckoned on the haunting and mesmerising atmospheric created by Etna.
Chic Sicily
After almost a week spent on coastal paths and mountains, it was almost a shock to end the trip in Sicily’s most famous and terribly chic resort, Taormina. First we had a walk up several hundred metres to the neighbouring hilltop village of Castelmora, had a quick swig of the local almond wine in a bar that specialised in displaying statues of male genitalia and admired the winding medieval streets.
We walked back down towards Taormina via the Saracen castle that gives you a superb view of the town’s Greco-Roman theatre – an odd sight as the Romans thoughtlessly filled in the spaces between the old Greek columns. Luckily for us, the brick walls are crumbling, exposing the original view of the sea.
A few hours were spent strolling through the main thoroughfare, Corso Umberto, swarming with holidaying Italians (on yet another public holiday) before we squeezed through its choked streets back to the tranquillity of Case Perrotta and another enjoyable meal with our entertaining and congenial travelling companions. Crowds or no crowds, Sicily offered me an experience I’m glad I didn’t refuse.
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