The Etna

In Sicily, Mount Etna is typically referred to as "L'etna" (The Etna) or simply Mongibella (The Beautiful Mountain), so important and powerful is it in the cultural ethos of the local community. She's a mighty beast, this Etna, and I'm not kidding around here. She's the tallest and most active volcano in Europe, and one of the most active volcanoes in the world. The last major eruption was in 2003 and the last minor one was in September. That's September, 2007. As in, 2 months ago. Rising over 3,300 meters above the Sicilain plains to the west and the Mediterranean to the east, she is as formidable as a tiger, as unstoppable as a hurricane, as proud as a lion, and as majestic as... a mountain?

Etna is not part of a mountain range of any kind; her 10,000+ feet are straight up from the ocean and so she makes you feel every inch of them. We flew into the city of Catania - a relatively large city right on Sicily's eastern coast, and from there took a (mafia-run) bus an hour to the small village of Nicolosi, some 800 or 900 meters up the mountain from Catania. This bus system is not AT ALL designed for tourists, as we quickly learned. The posted schedules were merely suggestions, and none of the buses was labeled with a number or a destination. So, whenever we had to take one, we would have to ask all the drivers who were standing around, in Italian, if their bus went to Nicolosi. Once, the driver had to ask his passengers whether he went there or not. Unfortunately for us, they informed him that he did not. Eventually, we mastered this wonderfully Sicilian system and had no further troubles, though that first time was a bit harrowing.

From the windows of our amazing Bed & Breakfast we were able to look out and catch glimpses of the mountain, her tallest peak steaming and smoking away into the crisp Mediterranean sky. I should write a poem...

To get to the base camp at 2,000 meters, you have to take that same (mafia-run) bus up these narrow switchback mountain roads for about an hour. Don't ask me how these bus drivers do it, but they managed to not kill us. We eventually got above the tree line and were traveling over roads that had just been rebuilt after the eruptions of 2002-2003. From about 1,500 meters up, you are driving and walking almost exclusively on fresh lava flows. Check out this buried house!

Once at the base camp, you take a cable car / gondola thing up to 2,500 meters. At this point, the views were already so incredible that we were skeptical that they could get any better, but of course, we were wrong. In this shot you can just barely see base camp and some roads a few hundred meters below us.

The cable car ended at about 2,500 meters. To proceed, you could pay the ridiculous sum of 25 EUR for an all-wheel-drive jeep / bus to take you up to the top, but that way is for semi-affluent retirees (as we quickly found out). Instead we decided to hike the 500 meters to the top. It took us just under 2 hours to get there, but that's while taking pictures every two or three feet. The terrain was, as I've said, entirely recent volcanic lava. At this point, we were well above the tree line and so the world became wonderfully monochromatic. The only colors were the black of the volcanic rock and the white of the snow. Below us, we could see almost the entire island of Siclily, the towns clustered around the base of the volcano, the city of Catania, the sea, and the Italian mainland across the strait of Messina. (insert low whistle...)

As we climbed, we were constantly looking in two directions and it was a struggle to decide which view was more amazing. Behind us was the gorgeous panorama I just described, but in front of us was this:

Now we weren't able to climb all the way to the top of the main caldera (at 3,300+ meters) because we didn't have time, nor obviously to the top of the QUITE active peak in this photo, but we were able to get to the top of the crater from the eruptions of 2002-2003, which sits 3,000 meters above sea level. From this point, we were above most of the cumulus clouds and could see for miles and miles. We were all struck pretty speechless (or as speechless as we can be) by sights like this:

Most of my compatriots on this trip agreed that climbing Etna was one of the best, if not the very best, thing that we've done so far in Italy. It's clearly very difficult to top climbing one of the most active volcanoes in the world. In fact, it wouldn't be possible unless we were on a plane! PUN!

Well, I'm spent... I'll leave you, dear reader, with this shot of the crater from 2003 (still smoking) with the main peak behind it. The next time you may question it, take this as a reminder that I am much, much cooler than you.