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Sun
Drenched Sicily, Italy
Modern Adventures amid Echoes of the Ancients
By Erin Nelsen
Standing in the Sicilian sun with your feet washed by
the waves of the Tyrrhenian Sea, it’s easy to forget
that there's more to the tri-corner island than beauty. |
The
beaches are magnificent---turquoise waters stretching
out to the horizon, soft sand, gentle waves and some of
the clearest water in the world. In the distance, on the
rockier portions of the coast, volcanic rock juts out
of the sea, its dark color and jagged edge adding drama
to the vista. Inland, the hills rise up and greet the
sun, patched with golden fields of grain, vibrant citrus
orchards, and the vineyards that produce Sicily's fragrant
nero d'avola wines. The skies are blue, the weather is
warm, and somewhere, a few steps down a narrow street,
someone is rolling fresh pasta to tempt you back from
the shore. There's no mistaking Sicily for part of mainland
Italy. Though Sicily has been officially part of Italy
for nearly 150 years, it has also been ruled in turn by
Greeks, Romans, Arabs, and Normans, and the island has
kept the flavors of each passing wave of conquerors. Only
a few blocks beyond the monuments to Vittorio Emanuele
II outside the train station in Palermo are palaces and
churches with the domes, mosaics, and geometric loveliness
of medieval Arab architecture. Baroque details line graceful,
decaying buildings that shade sprawling markets and tanned
children playing soccer in the streets. Most visitors
come to Sicily for the weather: the climate is warm year-round,
and in the summer months the sunshine is constant and
temperatures hover around 86 degrees Fahrenheit. But in
Sicily, history, culture, and natural wonders are layered
on so Sicilythick that the trouble is in choosing the
adventure, not finding it.
One adventure worth having, though, is a voyage to the
Aeolian Islands off the north coast. The ancient Greeks
and Romans called these islands the home of the winds,
and their breezes offer some relief from the constant
beat of the sun. One boasts the forge of the fire god
himself: Vulcano, a volcanic island reachable by ferry
or hydrofoil with sulfur baths and dark umber beaches.
Here, the intrepid and long-winded can climb to the top
of the sleeping volcano that spewed forth much of the
island and peer into the crater once said to be the entrance
to Hades. Though it hasn't erupted in a century, Vulcano's
main crater is far from extinct, its peak smoking with
sulfur from multiple exhaust holes and the giant divot
of its mouth still muddy-looking and dangerous. The rock
that surrounds the crater is as brittle and sharp as ceramic.
Signs warn that hikers should spend no more than a few
minutes at the top, lest the fumes intoxicate or poison
them. Still, with the wind blowing freely on the sweat
spent making it up, the feeling and the view are well
worth the scorching hour-long climb.
While the ancient Greeks assigned their gods' homes on
the outer islands, though, they worshiped them on Sicily
itself. And after experiencing PlazaVulcano's primordial
power, you can remind yourself of the force of human culture
in the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento. Here a complex
of Greek temples was hewn from the native red sandstone
and erected on a ridge overlooking the countryside, with
the hazy cerulean smudge of the Mediterranean visible
below the swell of the fields. Modern Agrigento rises
to one side, and majestic sandstone forms cascade down
the slope, linked by a pale road the Romans called the
Sacred Way.
Each temple has its own appeal. The temple to Hera offers
the best view and perhaps the most picturesque profile,
perched atop the high point on the temples' ridge. The
sanctuary to Concordia is nearly intact despite the twenty-odd
centuries since its construction, and dark shadows hide
its inner depths even at the height of the day.
The temple of Zeus, meanwhile, is massive and almost completely
destroyed, its ruins now poetically crumbling courtyards
and staircases among the aloes and olive trees. The temple
of Heracles demands humility, one row of its massive columns
still standing and each one three times as wide around
as the arm span of the average man. Together, the complex
inspires awe---after two millennia, its structures are
not only standing, but ethereally beautiful and seemingly
indestructible.
Sicily's mysteries are too many and too varied to explore
in one short trip. But like the striking beauty of the
island itself and the cultural marks so many have made
on it, the memory of them will surely endure.
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Related Travel Pictures
Same activities: Hiking
Monuments
Same environments: Beach
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Same geography: Europe
Resource: Travelsinparadise.com |
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