August 2020 – 7 days with family and friends
Just off the northeast coast of Sicily, there is a magical group of islands called the Aeolian Islands. They are a great way to extend your visit to Sicily, but they are even better as a stand-alone trip since it can take a while to explore all the far-reaching corners. There are no sandy beaches in this rocky part of the Meditteranean, but even sand lovers will be persuaded by the clear water, erupting volcanoes, and incredible views. And of course, there was the warmth of the Sicilian people and the delicious food.
Like the rest of our travel guides, this is not an all-encompassing account of everything we did. We do not want to make a list of ‘Best’ or ‘Must-do’ experiences since we know it depends on your personal preferences. These are only our personal favorites and they are divided into two groups: “Avventura Favves” and “Other Things We Liked”.
The Avventura’s Salina Island Map
Overview
We had considered visiting the Aeolian Islands during the first summer of our avventura, but we had so many other great stops planned and it does take a bit of extra time to get there. We’re happy we waited and did not rush the experience, because it is better to be on “island time”.
We weren’t sure which island to choose from the group. Lipari is a little bigger with more options for staying and eating. Vulcano is the closest to the mainland so is the easiest to get to, has sulfur baths (with a terrible smell), and an awesome name. Stromboli also has an awesome name and a volcano that erupts nightly. Panarea is quiet and popular among the rich and famous. Filicudi is even quieter, and remote Alicudi is like where Tom Hanks and his buddy Wilson got stranded. In the end, we were very happy we chose Salina. It’s known as the green island with a foodie culture which was just perfect for us. There were several hotel options, plenty of delicious restaurants, great wineries, and the activities were never more than 25 minutes away. An added fun fact was that it was the location where the Oscar-winning movie Il Postino (aka The Postman) was filmed.
Avventura Favves
Wine, capers, super fresh limpets and a singing Sicilian at Fenech Winery
Fenech Winery – Most of our best experiences while traveling occur when something surprising or unexpected happens. When the shirtless best friend of the owner of Fenech Winery rolled in on his scooter with super fresh (still moving) limpets as we started our tasting, we knew we were in for a treat. Everything at the winery was incredible. From the perfectly crisp, cold malvasia wine and the fresh homemade food loaded with Salina’s homegrown capers to the singing shirtless Sicilian, it was such a good time. They also make a limoncello that we thought was the best we ever had, but that could have been the malvasia talking. We ordered a few cases to ship back to Turin.
Pollara Beach – This was a beautiful and unique beach on the west side of the island. It was a bit of a hike down (and up), but worth it for the swim against the sheer rock face of the cliffs above. Bring water shoes and definitely stop at L’Oasi Snack Bar for delicious food and drinks after hiking back up to the car.
Hike to Monte Fossa delle Felci – The highest peak on the island has absolutely incredible views. It was about 2 hours each way and took lots of encouragement for the kids. We were definitely bummed when we finally reached the top because it was so cloudy we couldn’t see anything. But, luckily we had read a blog that said to wait out the clouds. Our patience paid off and within 20 minutes, we had incredible views. Another 20 minutes passed and it was cloudy again as we started our descent. The trail begins from the Valdichiesa church.
Boat Tours of Surrounding Islands – We love being on boats. It’s such a relaxing way to enjoy the water and scenery, without the crowds or schlepping of gear. We did three different boat experiences in our 7 days on the islands. Our absolute favorite was a sunset cruise watching Stromboli erupt at night. We enjoyed fresh bruschetta and wine while watching it explode every 15 minutes. On other boat trips, we swam in the clear waters around Salina and Lipari and buried ourselves in the black sand of Panarea. Although it was high on our list to see the mud/sulfur springs of Vulcano, it’s more touristic vibe and wasn’t a favorite of ours (go to the Azores or Ischia instead).
Restaurants
Didyme – This was a classy restaurant near the port in Salina with well-prepared and delicious dishes. If you’ve never eaten gambero rosso (red prawns that you eat raw and have a very creamy consistency), try it here. The cannoli was delicious and they also recommended really good, reasonably priced wine. We booked through Facebook.
Villa Carla – This is a husband and wife team that cooks out of their home with only 3 tables on their front porch. We really enjoy these types of home-based experiences. We had a great mixed plate antipasti and surprisingly they had a large number of pastas, and fish dishes to choose from. The desserts were amazing too.
Alfredo in Cucina – This is a casual waterfront spot among the small, but busy town of Lingua. This was the perfect place to try the excellent traditional foods of the island: namely pane cunzato (which is a base of bread topped with a heap of all kinds of ingredients (kind of like a bread salad), as well as granita and cannoli.
Granita at the kiosk near the port of Santa Marina Salina. We fell in love with granita on our first trip to Sicily in 2018 (so much so that it has its own blog post), and we perfected our love in Salina. We ate it every day. The mandorla [almond], pistachio, and gelso [mulberry] were delicious as always, but on Salina, they also had ricotta granita, which sounds strange but was really good. Kai continued to order his classic combination of lemon and chocolate.
Pa.Pe.Ro’ – a chic little stop for granita, and cannoli, or a cocktail. Right next door is Pizzeria da Marco that is supposed to be very good, but we never got a chance to try it.
Mentuccia – This is a tiny hole in the wall shop with a mother and daughter jarring their own items. It is located just off the charming, little shopping street in Santa Marina and offers plenty of choices to take home the flavors of the island.
We’ve talked a lot about granita, but our other favorite Sicilian food item is the arancino. It’s fried cone-shaped deliciousness, filled with rice and typically ragu sauce and cheese or some other tasty filling. They are available at bakeries or other street food places. Yummy, cheap, and satisfying.
Cannoli are also worth mentioning here. Lynn doesn’t love them because the ricotta filling is too much like cheesecake which she doesn’t enjoy (nobody’s perfect), but our friends are cannoli aficionados and they ate cannoli wherever we went. The ones at Pa.Pe.Ro’ and Alfredo were particularly noteworthy, but there were plenty of bakeries with good ones. Just make sure you get them from a place that is filling them to order and not already prepared.
Other Things We Liked
La Villa Rossa – We stayed at this family summer home turned has been turned into a bed and breakfast for parts of the year by Annagiulia. They have nice rooms overlooking the water, a very good breakfast included, and a big pool with a diving board that the kids (and adults) enjoyed (made fools of themselves).
Ristorante Signum – This 1-star Michelin restaurant features a young female chef whose family owns the ultra-luxury hotel property associated with the restaurant. We enjoyed the tasting menu with wine pairings. It was pricey but very good.
Osservatorio di Rinella – This is a great casual spot for cocktails with an incredible view overlooking the water.
Salvatore d’Amico winery – This casual family winery provided a nice tasting with a lot of delicious food choices, including the most amazing caponata and Slow Food capers.
Logistics and Miscellaneous Notes
- We flew from Turin to Catania in Sicily, and a pre-scheduled van drove us the 2 hours to Milazzo, which is the port town where the ferries for the Aeolian islands depart from. Palermo airport is another option if you are flying to Sicily to specifically go to the Aeolian Islands.
- Ferry from Milazzo if you are already in Sicily. The ferry is actually a high-speed hydrofoil with far fewer seats (and no room for cars) than the typical ferry. We did not reserve in advance because we were concerned about flight delays, but the boat we wanted was booked and we had to hang around in Milazzo for an hour waiting for the next one.
- There are ferries to Calabria (town of Vibo Valentina) if you’re going to Tropea.
- Since we wanted to explore the various parts of the island we decided to rent a car for the week. Oh boy. This will probably be another post at some point, but car rentals are supposed to be a basic part of travel and yet they often are so memorable (usually in a bad way). On the island of Kefalonia in Greece we had an amazing experience where it was a quick handoff of the keys to a good car at a reasonable price, but more often than not they are terrible, which we still can’t understand. Usually, we get super annoyed by having to wait a long time for something we pre-booked and clearly do not want any of the extras they are trying to sell. On Salina, the transactional process did not take very long, but let’s just say the cars were not in optimal condition. Considering the Google reviews for all of the car rental companies were less than 2 we were somewhat prepared. We thought we were doing our friends a favor by giving them the Mercedes, but considering it constantly would just stall for no reason, we were quite happy with our crappy, dinged-up Citroen. Our other friends only drive automatic and they were able to find one, with another company, but somehow their car would also stall. We didn’t even know that was possible with an automatic. Well, the benefit of these kinds of rentals, is that even if you scratch it up they don’t really care. When we returned the car, the guy just grabbed the keys, jumped in, and drove off without checking to see if there were any new dents (Dave still claims he did not reverse into that light pole).
Next Time We Go
We were very happy with our choice of Salina over the other islands, but 7 days on one island is a little slower of a travel place than what we are used to. Perhaps we should have split the trip and spent a couple of days on Stromboli or Panarea.
We also would have liked to hike to the top of Stromboli but it was closed. Which after all the complaining on the hike to Monte Fossa maybe wasn’t so unfortunate.
The Avventura 