Nicolosi to Modica – 10 May

Yesterday we left Etna behind us and drove to our new base in Modica, via the Pantalica Gorge. The drive was congestion down the mountain, high speed autostrada round Catania and then a maze of tiny, winding roads through the hills to the little town of Ferla. Navigating with the TomTom was tricky in this area – it kept wanting to send us off reasonable roads and up goat tracks, presumably to save us a few metres distance. I learnt to just ignore it at times!

We picked up a couple of pizzette in Ferla to have for lunch.  J snapped the main activity happening and we spotted this church, which is in what I call the “Bashed Baroque” style.  If Mickey Rourke was a church, he’d look like this.

 

About 10 km out of town is the Pantalica Gorge, the site of a kingdom called Hybla, founded by people fleeing invaders of coastal areas in about 1300 BC. Hybla lasted about 600 years, but all that is left now is an overgrown field with a few stone foundations of what was once a large palace and over 5,000 tombs hewn into the limestone cliffs. The area was also populated in mediaeval times and there are the remains of a couple of tiny Byzantine chapels, perhaps created by remodelling Hybla tombs.

We made two descents into the gorge, exploring what looked to be the remains of roads, an aqueduct and scores of tombs on tracks overgrown with wildflowers, and at times raspberries and figs. Our second descent also took in the remains of a railway line and train station, built in the early 1900s, that used to run from Siracusa to Ragusa and Vizzini. The 20 km section from Sortino to Palazzolo Acreide is now a very nice cycleway! If bikes could be hired from either end, it would be a great way to explore this area.

The contrast between the lush valley floor and exposed, rocky heights was pretty stark by mid afternoon, with a very hot climb back to the car.  J insisted on a quick stop at the modern necropolis outside Ferla and snapped this spooky shot. (Gotta love the architecture in Italy, which extends to the family mausoleum. There are the regular apartments for the lower and middle classes, and then these very upmarket and elegant dwellings to house the remains of the upper classes.)

Then another hour on minor roads to Modica. We have a little apartment here in the centre of the old town for the next 3 days - very nice, but with very noisy plumbing! The car is parked in the street a few hundred metres away (at least I hope it’s still there) in the midst of a labyrinth of tiny one way streets. So getting out of and back into here in the next few days could be “interesting”…