On the Ferrovia Circumetnea

Our final day of living the Sicilian life sees us once again at Catania’s central railway station for the short trip to Riposto.  It is as if the Italian transport network knows our time is nearly up, and after a week of frustration at its hands, there is one more twist of the knife, the ticket machine swallowing our ten euro note whole.  For Lizzie, it’s the final straw – for me, it’s utterly typical of a system crippled by inefficiency, ramshackle to the very point of collapse, a bit like a smashed pottery vase that has been glued back together with pritt stick.  One thing I shan’t miss is Sicilian public transport.

Unfortunate, then, that for our final day, we’ve chosen to take the Ferrovia Circumetnea, whose beat-up little trains complete a near-full circuit of Mount Etna, starting in Riposto, and ending in the suburbs of Catania.  The guard on board has apparently never heard of tickets before (biglietto, the only word in Italian we were sure we knew!), nor has he heard of Catania, but we do eventually pay our fares, as our little train chugs, mechanically, out of Riposto and up into the lush hills.  It’s amazing at how quickly the urban sprawl falls away, and soon we are passing almond groves, vineyards, and rustic little settlements, all the time ascending.  A glance around the train is something of a surprise – we assumed it would be populated by tourists, but Sicilians in these parts rely on the railway as a means of getting to-and-from the city, and to my eye, we’re the only non-natives on the carriage.

Up into rural Sicily on the Ferrovia Circumetnea

The train has many stops on its long journey around the volcano, and our ticket acts as a “hop-on hop-off” service, so we break the journey at the hill town of Randazzo.  Sleepy, peaceful, and empty are all words that accurately describe the town – there is barely anybody around, save for groups of old men who sit around the squares putting the world to rights, and staring with surprise as we walk by.  Perhaps, after all the places we’ve visited, we’ve finally gone “off the beaten track” and wandered into a world unused to our presence.  Or maybe it’s just because everything is closed, save the local convenience store, and the archaeology museum, which is intriguingly housed in Castello Svevo, a little fortification that once made up a much larger castle.  Inside, ancient vessels, coins, and ornaments present a cute collection, whilst down in the cells, a group of traditional Sicilian puppets are the undoubted highlight.  The museum curator, probably bored rigid in the silence, makes us feel very welcome, and tells us all about the town’s church and its festivals.  Back outside, we eat lunch on Piazza San Martino, making a sharp exit when a huge swarm of bees comes buzzing through the square, no doubt following their queen to pastures new.  If I were a bee, I’d happily stay in Randazzo – it’s pretty, it’s rural, and nothing will ever disrupt its total lack of activity.

Randazzo station

Piazza San Martino with Castello Svevo

Back on the train, the scenery gets serious as we lurch west, and come around the north side of the volcano, where snow still sits on the crags, a brilliant contrast to the dark rock underneath.  Away from the mountain, the undulating landscape stretches off into the distance, green, fertile, and lovely in the summer sun.  We stop at many unnamed little platforms, before entering a landscape populated with pistachio trees.  We don’t get off at Bronte, but the town is famous for the nuts, and around 85% of all pistachio nuts eaten in the whole of Italy are grown and processed here, in these hills.

The north side of Etna

The rolling landscape north of Etna

After Bronte, the train begins a long descent, and then something odd happens; we go underground.  Stranger still, whilst under there, our rural little train pulls into a station akin to a London tube stop.  This unexpected twist is the town of Adrano, which we are told is worth an hour’s stroll, and so we take an escalator up to ground level, and wander into town.  There’s nothing here, save for a small park, a Norman castle and a church (the latter two are closed), and we are quick to retrace our steps back to the tube, where a 45-minute wait gives us a chance to reflect on our week.  Certainly we’ve enjoyed ourselves, but this has not been an easy or relaxing holiday, and I think in many ways, we’re both relieved to be heading back home, having suffered too long in the heat, and fallen victim too often to Sicilian inefficiency and inconsistency.

Adrano's Norman castle

After Adrano, and our reappearance in the open air again, the landscape becomes slowly less dramatic, steadily more ugly, and we are soon rattling through the suburbs of Catania.  I’m almost asleep when we finally reach the terminal station, Catania Borgo, and as the travelling crowds quickly disperse (lucky them, they know where they’re going), we are once again left scratching our heads at a map that has consistently failed to get us where we want to be.  In the end, we shove it back in the bag and follow our noses, down unnamed streets, across unsigned squares, dodging traffic and sweltering under a ceaseless sun.  It is an ending that perfectly encapsulates what our week has all been about – indeed, what I think Sicily is all about – to forget everything you know about anything, to throw caution into the wind, to leave it all up to fate, and to wait and see what ends up happening.  It may well be that we return from Sicily with a more fatalistic approach than when we arrived; but perhaps that’s just how you become when you've lived a few days in the shadow of a great, active volcano.