Our port of Messina does not have any of the usual historic buildings that we've become used to over the last couple of weeks. Firstly, mother nature pretty well destroyed the town with earthquake & tsunami in 1908 and after rebuilding, it was devastated by Allied bombing in WW2.
We are doing the Princess trip to the ancient city of Taormina and then on to Mt Etna. This is a full day trip, starting at 8.00, so yes, room service breakfast. Hazy sort of morning as of course we are getting closer to Africa 😀. Seriously, it looks like a great day just a pity about the hazy conditions.
There are just 25 of us on our 48 seater bus, so plenty of room to spread out. It was around 45 minute drive along the coast (well actually above the coast through numerous tunnels & viducts) to Taormina, which while described as a coastal resort town is actually about 700m above sea level. We did however see many costal resorts below on the beaches. Taormina has been a resort town since the Greeks were here in 300 BC. They built the famous theatre at that time, but later in 100 AD the Romans modified it and the theatre is still in use today.
Theatre
My Etna in the background
The coffee
The theatre is at the far end of town, which is predominantly vehicle-free. As noted earlier, the haze restricted photos of the coastal area and to a great extent, Mt Etna in the distance. On our way back to the bus (quite a journey and getting hotter by the hour) we stopped for a lovely Iced Coffee - it was delicious *and* expensive at €9 each. Hey, we are on holiday.
It was then an almost 2 hour drive up the slopes of Mt Etna, including some very winding areas (but we are now used to that). Although the peak of the mountain is over 10,000ft, we just went up 6,500ft to the end of the normal road. Here there are numerous volcanic craters to explore or at least walk around. The scoria is very slippery, so we took it carefully. What I hadn't realised is that there are dozens of craters, lava flows etc. all over the mountain area - not just one big cone. The map also showed the more recent eruptions etc. including quite a number in 2017. Oops.
We had a set lunch, which truely was traditional with bruscetta, pasta & then pignolata for desert - all washed down with copious quantity of the local red. A restful journey all the way back to the ship ensued. Surprisingly our driver had been a professional singer in a previous life, so he entertained us with his magnificent singing as we roared around at 100kmph in and out of numerous winding tunnels. Very good.
Thankfully it was a little cooler up the mountain-just 29° but as we came back down towards the coast it went up to 34° at least. The volcanic soils encourage the growth of various vegetables, but mainly grapes, olives and lemon trees. There are also apparently groves of Chamomile trees, but I am not sure what they look like. Oleanders are their preferred roadside and motorway central garden trees and they do a good job at hiding the rubbish.
Back on board before 4.30 and slipped our mooring right on time at 6.00pm. We were joined in port by Club Med 2, which is a cruise/sailing ship. Looks impressive and would be interested to know how often they actually set their sails. Just after 9.00pm we sailed past Stromboli Island - home to an active volcano. It was a lovely moon-lit night, but no fireworks, just flashes (which looked like torchlights) from the crater.
Day 47 - 17 July - Salerno
Oh dear, we woke to rain (quite heavy) as we pulled into port, but thankfully it didn't last and we were still able to have breakfast on the balcony. We had a boat trip to Amalfi, as although we'd done the Amalfi Coast by bus 5 years ago, we thought that it would be fun to see the area from the sea.
Well our expected 1 hour leisurely cruise along the coast became a 30 minute extreme sea experience. Yes, it was *very* rough and we had people sick as well. However Amalfi itself is a lovely Italian town (like so many others) and we enjoyed a €4 coffee and stroll through town before it was time to get back to our little cruiser. This time we were able to get prime seats upstairs, so had great views of the coastline. Although it was a bit rock n roll, it was not as bad as our outward trip.
It was just a half day excursion, so we were back by 12.30 and up to HC Cafe where we grabbed a ham roll and a cool drink which we bought back to our balcony and watched the world go by. Interestingly, this port is also a major transport hub, but with smaller ships and just the trailers being transported. We watched 6 (including a converted car-carrier) unload/load while we were in port. I have no idea what is coming or going - but there is a lot of it!!
Sailaway from Salerno
Day 48 - 18 July - at sea
Nice to have a relaxing sea day as we sail across the Mediterranean. Just after breakfast we sailed between Corsica & Sardinia, pretty well the last bit of land until we reach Spain tomorrow. As the afternoon progresses the weather is getter warmer and the sea smoother. Fingers crossed for our arrival on time tomorrow as we have a pre-booked trip to the Pyrenees and have to be in central Barcelona by 8.30.
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