Sicilian Romance: A couple’s guide to Sicily

( Daily Mirror UK – 2013 – Roland Ellison )

With its beautiful beaches, charming old towns and gorgeous views, the island of Sicily was the perfect escape for a bride and groom who decided they needed a romantic holiday before getting married.

Any Sicilian will tell you… Sicily is different. The Mediterranean’s largest island has its own pace of life, its own wines, its own delicacies. I went there with my bride-to-be to relax for a week before our wedding. We hired a car and visited four destinations on a six-day whistlestop tour…

Bustling Palermo

Arriving late on a Saturday night, with 12 hours to kill before we picked up our hire car, we only had enough time for a cursory glance at Palermo. After the bus journey from the airport, we checked in to our nicely air-conditioned room at Porta Felice (rooms from £56pp B&B).

A quiet Sunday morning was ideal for a stroll around the fountains and features of the city, and our favourite spot was the Piazza Vigliena, or ‘Quattro Canti’. Never has a simple crossroads been so glamorous.

Our next stop was lunch at the old haunt of the notorious Mafia boss ‘Lucky’ Luciano. Antica Fococceria S Francesco is a no-frills self-service canteen that serves cheap and cheerful Sicilian street food – our first taste of authentic Sicilian fare.

We had sardines stuffed with apricots, a delicious caponata (an aubergine-based Sicilian speciality) and I braved the focaccia maritata – a bap, filled to the gunwales with veal lung and spleen carpaccio (fried in lard and seasoned with lemon), ricotta and grated caciocavallo cheese. Sounds disgusting, I know, but it was actually pretty tasty.

Good job we’d eaten too, as our next stop – following a lengthy stopover at the chaotic car hire office in downtown Palermo – was not best suited to an empty stomach. The macabre tourist attraction at the Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini), has to be seen to be believed. Visitors walk around underground crypts dating back to the 16th Century, which house the well-preserved remains of some 8000 souls from Palermo’s past.

Although morbidly fascinating, it does feel slightly disrespectful to be peering at the dead like this, and on reflection, it probably wasn’t the most romantic spot to take my bride-to-be – but it was certainly memorable.

From the Catacomb in northern Palermo, we set off to cut a diagonal line through the centre of Sicily, to the seaside town of Syracuse on the south east.

Seaside Syracuse

A popular spot for Italian holidaymakers, Syracuse (Siracusa) has a real holiday feel. We stuck to the old town, Ortigia, which sits on an island accessible only by bridge.

The view from our room at the Grand Hotel Ortigia looked out at the boats on the water, and with a fun fair for kids and stall-lined narrow streets leading up to the stunning bleached-white Piazza del Duomo, there is plenty here to keep you amused. The recently-cleaned cathedral is simply breathtaking, and there’s a WWII bomb shelter underneath it, which is also worth a look. If that’s not enough, Syracuse boasts one of the largest Greek theatres ever built. Get there early on to avoid the crowds.

Our favourite spot was the food market, right next to the ruins of the Greek Temple of Appollo. Here, Flo from Il Gusto dei Sapori Smarriti (literally, the Taste of Flavours Lost), gave us numerous samples of Italian delights, including smoked mozzarella, cold meats, and our favourite, smoked ricotta.

We bought a whole one and had it with dried fruit and honey for breakfast most mornings thereafter.

Baroque Modica

Feeling more relaxed, we took the long cross country drive from Syracuse to Modica, the ‘City of Chocolate’. The main street, Corso Umberto, lined with its palm trees and beautiful old buildings is an unspoilt slice of Sicily’s Baroque past.

Modica’s centre runs along the bottom of a valley, surrounded on all sides by steep spaghetti mounds of humanity. It’s a unique-looking city, which is hellish to navigate by car, but easy for pedestrians as hidden staircases around every corner take you up through the network of narrow lanes in no time.

Famed for its traditional chocolate, no visit to Modica is complete without a trip to the Caffe dell’Arte for coffee and a snack. For the record, my cannoli were simply heaven sent.

We opted for a self-catering flat just a few flights from the centre. I say ‘self-catering’, but behind the unassuming doors of our digs lay a Tardis-like two-storey apartment, complete with wine in the fridge, cooking essentials at the ready, an iPad, DVDs, books and a well-stocked bar with an honesty box – now that’s living.

Born of boss Valerio Molinari’s deep-seated hatred of hotels, which he’s built up over years of business travel, the concept of Monoresort self-catering accommodation is to give you all the privacy and relaxation of being in your own space, with the comfort of a five-star hotel – including a personal assistant. Ours, the charming Enrica, was invaluable. She arranged restaurant bookings, offered to do the shopping and take us on local excursions. Our very own local, on hand with advice and help whenever we needed it.

Having booked us a table on the terrace at the fancy Torre D’Oriente , with its romantic views across the city – and excellent food, Enrica picked us up the next morning to drive us to a sandy beach.

We could have stayed in Modica for a week, and it was with heavy hearts that we bade farewell to Enrica and set off alone again for our final stop, Taormina.

Teeming Taormina

Just an hour or so from the sandy beaches of the south east, the climb to the Hotel Villa Sonia, perched on top of Taormina, was a complete change of scenery. The hotel has a gorgeous pool terrace and an unrivalled view of Sicily’s smoking volcano, Mount Etna, which was visible from our bed.

With its steep climbs, cable car to the beach, street performers, hawkers and teeming town centre, Taormina was by far the most touristy of the place we visited, and after Modica, it took some getting used to. But after a while, we warmed to its pretty pebble beaches and the mountain-top village of Castelmola up the hill from our hotel.