… 31 miles away on Mt. Tauro, reached on a gravity-defying road filled with tunnels and switchbacks. The town dates back to 39 AD, and it’s impossible to find a bad view. It took 50 minutes to reach Taormina from Messina, and we had about 2 1/2 hours to explore. The main street, Corso Umberto, is lined with chic shops and trendy restaurants. The town has several major plazas and many churches. One plaza has a fountain featuring an odd two-legged female centaur…
Stores offer everything from high-priced designer goods and stunning gold and silver jewelry to inexpensive souvenirs. The souvenir best sellers are lava stone objects, models of brightly painted Sicilian horse carts, and Sicily’s unusual city symbol: a triangular object with three legs and the face of Medusa in the middle. Not very pretty, but hanging everywhere!
The weather was brilliant: sunny and cool, with bright blue skies. Time flew – so many cute stores, so little time for each one!
We had a quick view of Mt. Etna in the distance on the way up the mountain to Taormina; it was billowing puffs of white smoke against its snow-capped peak. At 11 am, the Italian government announced that Mt. Etna was officially erupting! Several tour groups from the ship were on Mt. Etna at that time, and recorded video of the eruptions, along with the accompanying booming sounds. It was very fortunate that it chose that moment to erupt – and that the groups don’t really get that close to the current vents. We saw the dark smoke on the peak on our way back to Naples.
After a quick trip back to the ship, we joined our friends Lee and Troy in a search for a good Italian dinner ashore. Unfortunately it was 5:15 pm – between lunch and dinner. We finally abandoned the search and had some pizzettas and arancini (rice balls) with local Messina beer. We topped that feast with some heavenly cannolis from the bakery next door. Messina is known for its cannolis and these were unbelievably good; the shells were filled fresh, after we ordered them, the cheese filling had chopped nuts in it, and they were each dusted nicely with powdered sugar. Three were gone before I remembered to take a picture!
Mmmmm…. Quite the way to top off our Sicilian adventure!
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