Taormina (Part 1)

We surveyed Taormina from our anchorage just off Giardini Naxos. By night it was lit up beautifully.

And in the morning it was equally spectacular. We took the dinghy ashore to Giardini Naxos and caught a bus up to Taormina. The road was a series of hairpin bends with barely enough space for the coach to get around. Several times the driver had to back up to manouevre past them. It was amusing to see the Italian drivers, with their usual philosophy of never selecting reverse and thus give away ‘their’ road space (even under pain of death or repeated toots on the horn by the opposition), grudgingly accept, after lots of emotional discussion and hand waving, that they had to back up when the road ahead was completely blocked by our bus coming up the hill.

As we climbed up the hill in the coach, and from a viewpoint by the bus terminus, we could look down on Isola Bella; what had looked quite plain from the sea was much prettier from the land perspective.

Taormina is the site of one of the most impressive surviving ancient theatres so we headed there first. Founded in the 3^rd century BC by the Greeks, the theatre was extensively reworked in the 1^st century AD and so the ruins that we saw were almost entirely from this Roman era.

The theatre is still used for international arts festivals and concerts. They were preparing for one when we visited and, whilst the large screen did somewhat detract from our touristy perspective, there is no doubting that this is a spectacular venue with outstanding panoramic views.

The Roman influence is apparent elsewhere in the town, including a much smaller odeon which was, apparently, used for music recitals rather than the more mixed bag of entertainments, including gladiatorial contests, that were put on at the main theatre.

We stumbled upon the odeon as we started our climbed up to the hilltop church of Madonna delle Grazie. From the Via Circonvallazione at the top of town, we made our way up 537 steps where we found the small church which had been built into the rock.

It may have been a bit of a slog in the heat of the afternoon but the views down over Taormina were just amazing. As well as the obvious Greek Theatre, we picked out the public gardens, which we would visit when we’d climbed down. However, first we needed to climb up another 140 steps to the hilltop Saracen’s Castle, described in our guidebook as “an agreeably crumbly castle”. Agreeable it may be, but having climbed up to it we discovered that it is closed for a couple of hours in the afternoon for lunch. Disappointed that we had missed out, we went back down the 677 steps and consoled ourselves with a few scoops of fabulous Italian ice-cream. Rather than visiting a café for a coffee when we need to access the internet, we have recently made a habit of visiting a gelateria (ice-cream parlour) instead because they generally have wi-fi too. In Lipari they also gave us a complementary glass of Sicilian Malvesia wine with our ice-creams, sadly a practice we have not seen elsewhere. From what we have seen, we think the Italians eat the largest amount of ice-cream in the world per capita, as well as that statistic for pasta, but we think that is justifiable as their ice-cream is so very good.

Taormina was busy with tourists but full of character. Glitzy boutiques, flower-filled balconies and restaurants tucked away in every corner all added to the charm. The main streets are interconnected by stepped narrow alleyways decorated with flowers and artwork. It is easy to see why this is such a popular tourist destination.

Because of Corpus Christi, the Artists’ Street had been decorated with pictures surrounded by flower petals and everywhere the wires across the streets had been decorated with flowers.

And we were also lucky enough to arrive at the Piazza IX Aprile during a rally of old sports cars. An hour later, when we passed back through, they had all gone.

Continued in Part 2 (too many pictures for one blog entry)