We’re making our way to Catania. The original plan was to take the ferry from Stromboli to Lipari, then another to Milazzo, then the train to Messina, and finally another train to Catania. We did a little research while waiting for our first boat and discovered there was a direct ferry from Stromboli to Messina, saving us a ferry and a train ride and about 2 hours of travel time. We obviously jumped on the idea and changed our ticket.
A little concept we keep forgetting is the loose concept of time in Sicily. Your boat might be scheduled for 12:30, but 12:30 is an elastic concept. If it’s there within 45 minutes of the expected time, you can consider it on time. Since it’s a time-sensitive process, you need to allow plenty of time for connections between two modes of transportation. In our case, the boat was 30 minutes late, preventing us from catching the 14:30 train. We made it to shore at 14:30, and after the 10-minute walk to the station, we discovered the 14:30 train had left on time (to our surprise). It forced us to grab the 15:35, which turned out to be 1 hour late, so we decided to go with the regular regional train (slower than a regional véloce) that departed at 16:15. We finally arrived in Catania around 18:30, our train being 10 minutes late to begin with.
What should have been half a day of travel turned in a full day and what should have turned out to an afternoon of exploring Catania turned out to be a straight line to the groceries as we’ll need breakfast and snacks for tomorrow’s hike on the Etna (really the only reason to come to Catania), then head to our apartment to do a quick load of laundry so we have clean clothes for our next hike (they were still full of sand from the previous day hike on Stromboli) before running to grab diner.
The little we’ve seen of Catania didn’t make us feel safe. We’ve learned from our travels that we should never trust our feelings about a city we first meet at night. In any case, we’re not here for long. Tomorrow we’re hiking up the local volcano, and the following day we’re off to Siracusa.