Tu sei qui – you are here
On Thursday morning, Etna’s peak was annoyingly covered in cloud. The grumbling had stopped, or at least we couldn’t hear it. On the road out of Nicolosi, the land was quarried on both sides and in between each quarry were huge mounds of solidified lava, interspersed with boundless pink valerian, yellow broom and what looked like a tall heather on fire. It was a fascinating scenery and if it hadn’t been for the fabulous flowers, it would have felt a little like we were heading to Mordor.
The cloud sprawled across the top and gradually increased until we could no longer see the sun. But we kept stopping at every viewpoint and playing tag team with a French campervanning couple who had parked next to us the night before and were now doing the same as us. Each time he got out to take a photo, I got the giggles. He was wearing a skirt, long socks and trainers. No, not a kilt, it was a smart black skirt….!?!
Sadly, when we reached the Piazzale Rifugio Sapienza carpark, the weather was getting increasingly worse. It is possible to ride a gondola up to a ridge, but we watched them disappear into the clouds and decided it really wouldn’t be worth it. We popped into a café to escape the weather, hoping that it may have improved when we came back out. But it hadn’t. At the far end of the car park there are walking trails to two craters, so we headed off uphill to the top of the highest one first. It was a steep, tough, heart pumping walk because with each step forward, you slipped a little way back on the small, light, loose fragments of magma (lapilli).
When we walked up and around the Crater Silvestri, I seriously had to hang onto Rodney a few times, or crouch down really low. The wind was gusting at incredible strengths and I feared I was going to be blown into the crater, or off the sides. Looking around, it seemed like we were surrounded by drunk tourists, everyone was staggering around and being buffeted by the gale.
When we got back to Eileen, a police car pulled up and parked behind us. We, of course, hit the anxiety button. It turned out that they liked the look of Eileen and had driven over for a closer look. They even took a photo!
The road down from Etna South was very different amongst oak, pine and chestnut trees. Pine cones littered the tarmac and rain filled the potholes. By the time we reached Etna North, the rain was going sideways and the wind was rocking Eileen from side to side. Rodney dashed in and out taking photos of the amazing lava flow which apparently destroyed the ski resort and the roads in 2002 and 2003. I stayed dry and un-buffeted in the passenger seat.
At Linguaglossa Rodney won, as usual, on the bank cash teller machine and promptly crossed the road to a mechanic, to treat Eileen to new windscreen wiper blades. She had worked hard all day, up and down the volcano, in driving winds and rain; she deserved a treat. Camping Mokambo at Mascali turned out to have no view of Etna, sadly the cloud was still hiding the view, the showers were crappy, there was a large resident barking dog and the place was just tatty, so we didn’t bother staying a second night. Instead we’ve moved on to Letojanni, to Camping Paradise, which it isn’t, but it’s a lot better and it’s closer to Taormina. Tomorrow we’ll test the bus service and aim to spend the day there.
