Off season holidays in Sicily
50 to 50 to go or not go there again
What a great to have holidays!
I was curious to know that there is a Labor Law in Switzerland that prescribe employees to take at least 2 consecutive weeks of holiday every year. In fact every time after a long holiday I always feel like relaxed and for any work related issues you feel like to take more rational decision, isn’t it? During this holiday I never check my work email and managed to read a book written in German!
The idea of this post is to describe holiday in Sicily. Each chapter will contain description of one topic (e.g. Transport, Food, Accommodation, Prices, Safety, etc). Along with some tips I hope that this reading will be useful for anyone who is planning a similar trip in the future…
Planning of holidays
Today it’s so easy to just open your favorite search engine and just type [location name] AND [holiday home]. The formula of what you would need is the following:
** Apartment + Transport + Money **
Accommodation
Nowadays people who rent holiday homes are using various online portals. Some of those portals are really ripping off their clients gathering about 20% of the price paid by the customer as a service fee! This knowledge may be actually something to easily leverage a discount of 10-15% by contacting the landlord directly! Don’t be shy of doing this as often those people are very good in English! Probably the only thing you would loose while contacting the landlord is the ability to provide a review (good or nasty one :)
Transportation to the island
There are several ways to reach Sicily. In our case we used our car which we decided to place on the Ferry. Less drive possible with a direct way from Genova to Palermo that would take about 20 hours… There are few other options of course using a Ferry by driving more and sailing less by choosing port in Livorno, Rome or Naples…
There are several other possibilities though among which the airplane + rental car is probably something for those who want to come for 5-7 days only…
There is also quite a nice option to use train and bus and rental car. Assuming one hates the airplanes… There is an option to take a train from Milan down to Naples! After that moment one can take a bus towards Catania and later continue to any other place in Sicily by another bus…
Probably the only reason to choose your personal car [traveling within Europe] is the ability to stay longer and bring back some local products like local wine or freshly pressed olive oil… see below ‘Things to take back…’
Money
Good to have some cash or get it from many ATM on the island. Not mentioning that it’s often possible to pay with a credit card…
Roads
To our great surprise we learned that Highways are free in Sicily! Speed limit is 100km/h but quality of road is just great! However unfortunately highways are not everywhere but mostly in the north of the island…
Let’s talk about State roads ‘Strada Statale’. My personal advise is to avoid them if you drive at dark! Second advise is to be very careful while choosing the speed. Road signs may be very misleading. It’s better to follow common sense and not to create danger by driving much slower than traffic. Consider someone will be trying to overtake you hence creating more risks…
Road quality in the smaller roads and cities may be not that good. In this regards travel during the day would allow to spot those imperfections on your way…
Finally about round points. Almost everywhere in Europe it’s now a must to give a precedence while entering it. Instead we found a mix of old style where one has a precendence to enter and then carefully drive on it… could be really a challenge to adapt!
Food
One can probably find anything however things that probably worth to try are:
- Couscous with Fish
- Cassata - sweet dessert
- Cannolo siciliano - waffle filled with sweet soft cheese
- Pizzas with local ingredients
- Selections of local cheese
- Local seasonal fruits
In general the best ‘purchasing strategy’ is probably to find the established shop chain when purchasing products where food safety is important and find a small local shop where you can find local products. Unfortunately it is often the case when ‘big distribution chains’ are first transporting their products hundreds of km to one processing/packaging facility and then distribute everything back. Local shops are typically don’t have this so they may offer attractive prices especially for locally born fruits or vegetables. Additionally one may talk to the owner of this local shops to ask about local customs, places to visit, any other attractions in the area.
Sea
A huge advantage of the ‘off season’ is that it’s simply not to crowdy! There is no parking fees which would be otherwise in the ‘hot season’. Most of the time it would be possible to drive very closely to the coast line and just take a quick walk to the beach.
Of course ‘plastic in the ocean’ is still the topic. Especially after the storm one can find anything on the beach! We even found old Monitors, shoes, fishing nets… even more dangerous fishing hooks, cutlery and so on…
Nevertheless nature is still ‘fights back’ and one can observe places visited by the sea turtle!
Delimited nest of the Sea Turtle (picture after the storm)
Most of the bars would be closed however there still would be some especially on the places where there are still some residual tourists or locals
Sightseeing
While staying on the southern part of the island we managed to visit the following places:
- Sciacca - city port (primary place of stay)
- Trapani - city port on the west
- Erice - city on the hill near Trapani
- Agrigento Valley of Temples - museum and valley with several Temples
- Caltabelotta - city on the hill with magnificent views
- Masala - city where one can buy great wines
- Salt mine near Mamacaura
- Scala dei Turchi - a cliff made of Clay
- Heraclea Minoa - ruines of the ancient city
well there is no Etna in the list… perhaps any other time
Picture from Valley of Temples
Picture from Scala dei Turchi
Medical Services
Level of medical services may vary from place to place. We told that there are very modern facilities in Palermo, however once visited to the local place in Sciacca we found it a bit looking odd. At least externally. Conclusion is that for a small things there would probably be not any problem for a larger things one probably need to be very much careful
Things to take back…
Thanks to the season we went to the olive oil farms. On one of those we were able to see the process with our own eyes. Not only taste but even buy freshly pressed oil… Quite astonishing to take something that you see happen…
Device to check olive oil acidity
Green olives, dried tomatoes, conserved fish, origano, wine these are the things one may take back. Of course it really depends whether you came with your car or by public transport…
Conclusion
Nice rest, good food, fascinating views and sea is within the top highlights of this trip Bad roads, sea with plastic debris, accommodation and long transport are those things that could add some bitterness to the overall positive feeling…