Ciao! Here is our last day in Sicily.. better to say last morning, because during the day we’re going to cross the Strait of Messina. Our flight back to Germany was from a small town Lamezia, which is on the mainland of Italy, so we had to go there somehow. We bought a train ticket from Catania to Scilla which seems to be a nice place to spend a night before going to Lamezia, but we didn’t have any idea how train would cross the Strait. And this was probably the most unexpected way we could imagine we’d reach our destination.
That was a usual train, nothing special. Some 1,5h on the way with scenic views passing by the seashore, and we are here in the Messina, a crossing point for everyone. At some point our train started to slow down and OMG.. I noticed that the train, with several wagons, started to move into a giant liner. This took around 3-4 minutes. It turned out that there are special liners that help the trains/cars to cross the Strait. Once it’s ready, the ship started its move. Carefully leaving the port it started to cross the waters by making huge waves on the sea. 30 minutes of ride, during which we could leave our places, go up and enjoy the view from the side of the ship. Before reaching the destination port, there was an announcement to take our seats. And once we were in place, the train left the liner in the same way as entered. 10 more minutes, and we reached the destination – Scilla.
The first impression of the town was nice. This was a small lovely place with colorful houses on the coast, with a castle seen on top of the town. Even though it was not a season and there was almost no any tourist seen, the town was “alive”. We’ve noticed that during the day there were people with special equipment carrying out the beach, making it clean and comfortable. It’s said that the water is usually quite warm here during the high season. So if you want to spend your summer holidays in a place far from crowds, but still nice, you can consider planning a trip to Scilla 😉
First thing we had to do was to get to our booked room, to leave the luggage, after which the plan was to walk around and see what can we find interesting in this place. And you know what? Our building was on top of the hill, where we had to climb uncountable steps to reach. However, once we got our keys, entered the room, understood that it really worth to step up here to have such a view from our balcony! This was amazing!
The other side of this beauty was the decision to come back only when we won’t need to go back down (imagine doing this was few time a day! this would replace all gym exercises surely). Can’t really imagine how people live here 🙂 Just look at these streets of Scilla! And if you look carefully around you, you will see many statues and symbols related to Greek mythology, from where the name of the town comes from.
So, it’s time to explore this cute town and eat something.. we’re hungry 🙂
We left the room and started to walk around. Right on the edge of the hill there was a Castello Ruffo standing, built by Dukes of Calabria. It’s also called as Castello Ruffo di Calabria and is an ideal lookout location to protect the Calabrian lands from whoever arrives by sea. The history of this castle has ancient roots and started in the Etruscan era, then it became the defensive walls in the period of Magna Graecia. Unfortunately it was closed for some reason and we couldn’t enter inside, but if you’re lucky to be in Scilla, don’t forget to add this point in your list. The entrance ticket costs only 2 Eur and it hosts a museum with different exhibits.
Time to get some food for lunch. As it’s a low season for tourists, most of the places were closed. However we found a small restaurant on the beach, which was open, still with no visitors inside, and decided to take something here, with a sea view. We’ve ordered pizza here (of course, we are in Italy) and some home made white wine. This was a perfect decision we made, as we really enjoyed our meal. After that took some gelato and went out, to walk on the cobblestone beach.
We were not much lucky to have sunny weather, but still the view was awesome. We found a tunnel at the end of the beach and once crossed it, we appear on the other side of the town, which look totally different. This was a small port with lots of tiny boats of fishermen’s. Even during the daytime you could see the activity here, imagine what’s happening when these boats come back from the fish-hunting! And yes, seems like we were the only tourists/travelers here at this time, as locals were surprised seeing us there.
There were a lot of ways to go back to the top of the hill from this side of the town too. And of course, all were by steps only, passing cute houses around. We took a random way to go up and met a nice hidden gem of Scilla, Fontana storica della Sirena, a small fountain with mermaid’s statue. This was a glazed terracotta statue depicting a little mermaid holding a shell in her hand. Behind this composition, another large shell acts as a background. The sculpture recalls the tones of the myth to which Scilla is closely linked. If you also want to see this beauty, look for it on Via Grotte in the Chianalea district.
Little by little we step up to the top of the hill, closer to our place. But it was still early to go home and we continue strolling in the streets on this area. It was evening, almost everything closed. Seems this area is not much touristic, as only locals could be seen, and few cafes were only open.
It was light raining, and we entered to one of these cafes to have some tea (yes, it was also cold and windy). I should mention that lemons are super juicy here and have a different, better taste than in any other place. Green tea with such lemons was the perfect treat before sleep. And even at this time of the day the place looked gorgeous!
Finally our adventures in Italy (mainly in Sicily) came to the end and we had just one night left to spend here. Considering the very early flight schedule we selected a place to stay closer to the airport, in a small town called Lamezia Terme. Some 1,5h by train again, and we’re here. Honestly, we tried to find any interesting places to see and visit here, but couldn’t find any. So most of the time we spent by walking in the main streets of this town, where literally everything was closed. We even didn’t find any place to eat something and the only way not to stay starving was to buy some stuff from the one and only market we saw and prepare probably the best sandwiches here with Italian fresh baked bread, cheese, prosciutto and olives. Yummy!
The next day our room owner proposed to drive us to the airport which was very kind of him. If there was not his help, we would have to call a taxi, as there was no any bus running to the airport at that time. And the last surprise of this trip was the view we had from our airplane window: the monstrous volcano Vesuvius with whole its shape. That was scary to imagine the eruption and the area it could “cover” with its burning lava. 
With this my stories from the trip to Sicily end, but not from Italy itself.
Don’t go far, I still have a lot to tell you about some other cities and places, this time from the Northern part of Italy (and not only 😉 ).
My Life in Travel 