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| Young lava fields |
We had based ourselves in the small village of Nicolosi in order to get around the Etna national park.
The next few days we'd be exploring around this magnificent area - by car and by foot. On the first day the road took us through many small villages and started to climb higher on the mountain. Finally it started to look like no other place before; former lava fields were all over us. It literally looked like an ocean of volcanic rock that had froze at some point. We drove to the Northern side of the mountain where one of the ski centres is. It had all been rebuilt not long ago, since it had been totally destroyed in an eruption. The autumn colours added sensation to the otherwise pitch black lava fields that had cut down trees unforgivably on their way down.
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| Parco dell'ETNA |
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| Small roads in the national park |
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Autumn leaves |
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| Snowy slopes |
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| New road through lava fields |
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| Destruction |
Once we made our way back to the lower slopes, we took a spin around the famous Etna wine roads, making our first stop at Don Saro estate. The owner was nothing less than a generously welcoming Sicilian, according to whom “no cops are driving along these roads so you can taste as much as you can…” (kidding, I guess?)- and was pouring accordingly for each glass (well, that was just more for one of us!). We made another stop on a big estate that boasts weddings and other celebrations. They were kind enough to prepare us local cheeses and other snacks to go with the wines. We got a few bottles to bring home for Christmas and headed back to Nicolosi before it got dark. We were already getting pretty stoked for the next day's hike on Mt.Etna...
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| Don Saro Estate |
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| Another winery |
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| Wine, cheese & charcuterie |
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