Sicily, Part 2

From the day we arrived, Mt. Etna was shrouded in clouds. How could we see the summit? Drive and climb, of course!

Mt. Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world, rising over 10,000 feet. Eruptions have occured over the past 2000 years, one of the biggest in the 1600s. Since then, only one town has been destroyed, in 1928, even though there have been eruptions through the years including June of this year. We drove past fields of lava......

parked the car at the chair lift (yes, they ski there!), and rode up the mountain.

The landscape turned into shades of black and gray, with no life in sight.......except for those AWFUL beetles that I left on our house back in Minnesota!

Deciding against a "tourist" ride up to the summit in the clouds, we opted for just walking up to the nearest crater. Never mind that I had sandals on, walking on and sinking in lava-sand full of rocks and pebbles! Yet, we trudged on.....

....and reached the top of one of the craters where we could see steam seeping through the vents.

The clouds rolled in and the summit across the way eluded us, so we hiked back down to the chairlift, drifting back to sunshine and life. What a contrast!

Having enough of climbing, the next day we took a road trip about two hours west to see more of the island. We arrived at the Villa Romana del Casale, a huge Roman villa built around 320 AD. It had been buried for a thousand years from a landslide and only during this century has it been excavated. Work is still going on, trying to preserve the beautiful mosaic floors that are throughout this once-beautiful home of a rich Roman official. I was in awe, of course, thrilled with more ruins. Lyle.....not so much. I think he has had enough of OLD! "Where are the golf courses?" he kept asking!

For a virtual tour of what it could have looked like back then, check out http://www.romaland.it/.

On our way back, we went from the lush tropical countryside full of citrus and olive trees......

........through desert-like barren hills of clay, giving the surrounding towns a source for their thriving businesses of ceramics.

Lyle drove us through narrow alleys and streets in the town of Caltagione, famous for beautiful pottery and ceramics. We parked the car, only to discover.......

MORE STEPS!!!! Most of the shops were directly off of the 144 steps, lined with different patterns of tile! We couldn't break out string of climbing, I guess!

Coming all this way, we bought a few pieces to take home. However.....

...my pretty little napkin holder didn't make it from the car to the villa.

No problema, Mark and Kathy scouted Taormina the next morning and found a beautiful replacement for us!

We left our friends Sunday afternoon so they could enjoy a day or two to themselves....and headed to Rome where Lyle had a meeting on Monday. I tagged along.......excited to see a city that I had dreamed about visiting since studying about it in sixth grade! More ruins!

And, on the way to the airport, on a very clear day.........we finally could see the steam on top of Mt. Etna!