Stromboli

I actually managed to get some time off at Easter and I certainly made the most of it. Every since I read about Stromboli (more here), an active volcano in the Aeolian islands off the north coast of Sicilia, I’ve wanted to climb it. However, because it is, well, active, the authorities insist that you can only go up with a guide and all guided tours were shut for a few months due to some rather unusual activity. But as of the 1st of April they were going up again.

Stromboli is a special kind of volcano (you know, compared to all those boring ordinary kinds) because it’s pretty well constantly erupting. The whole island is the volcano, which in fact is like an iceberg – two thirds under the spectacularly blue Mediterranean sea. This was the view from my hotel room. 

The white buildings against the black volcanic sand were a nice effect.  There only only a few hundred permenant residents, although I suppose it gets absolutely swamped in the awful summer when hordes of people decend on the place.

But don't worry, I'm sure the local police keep them under control!  There are no real roads on the island and so no real cars, just these little golf cart things and also a sort of ultra mini van on a three wheeled motorcycle for want of a better description (like a tuk-tuk if you've been to Thailand).

I just would have loved to see a high speed chase :).

My second day I climbed the mountain.  I must say it looked a bit daunting from the bottom (2000 m) but in the end it wasn't too arduous.  This picture gives a great view of the little village of Stromboli, one of only two places on the island sort of flat enough to live on.  You can see how black the beaches are - up close they were all sparkly, very pretty.

Most of the people on the tour was foreigners, French, German, English, even a couple of Aussies.  A few Italians, sure, but amazingly (to me) many of the locals would consider a trip to Stromboli as a beach holiday and not think of doing the excursion!  I think that the image of the sporty (but always flashily dressed of course) Italian outdoorsy type belongs more the Alpine areas - the southerners are more the sit on a beach type.

There were lots of great views going up the mountain, not least of the ever present Mt Enta many kilometers to the south, but I'll jump straight to the chase... turn a corner into the sunset and there was the smoke drifting across the sky.

Stromboli consists of two extinct craters and one still bubbling - this one - which is located lower than the others.  So for most of the time we were actually above the craters looking down into the 800 degree boiling lava pits.   Awesome!

Unfortunately, as night falls my phone camera ceases to take decent photos.   This was the best I could manage to the show the explosions that happened about every 10 minutes or so.  So I stole a photo off the Stromboli online webite to give a better idea of what it was really like in person.

On the way down we had fabulous light-pollution free views of the sky (upside down) and could see the lights of Sicila and Calabria across the waters. 

I also enjoyed the rest of my time, scrambling over the lava rocks, going for a swim, eating too much fabulous seafood and pasta, visiting the main island of Lipari on the way home (I can't say that I enjoyed the hydrofoil over there though - technically interesting a ferry that pops up on skids might be, in practice for someone with my stomach however....) and seeing some of the villages between Milazzo down to Taormina when I got back to Sicila.  But it's definitely the volcano that made this visit particularly cool.

The lull in work continues, so next weekend I'm making my final big trip in Sicilia across to Palermo (the capital) and around the western half of the island.