These Islands Near Sicily Might Be the Last Uncrowded Part of Italy

Aug 30, 2019 449

BY: ANTONIA QUIRKE

Take an archipelago of seven small islands smelling of wild fennel and the open sea. Volcanic, sky-thrusting. Scattered 50 miles north of Sicily, the Aeolians are thought of throughout Italy as beautiful and natural—but mysterious. Volatile. Some 60 years ago they were near-deserted, but have since been passing between them the baton for southern Europe's most rugged glamour.

Sometimes it's Stromboli (beloved especially of Neapolitan left-wingers), and sometimes Panarea, and yet…two islands at the far western tip, Filicudi and Alicudi, remain a puzzle, suspended at a distance. On the shore of the more populated Salina, I sit in the village of Pollara in an orange fuzz of apricot trees, waiting to sail. Hedges vibrate with ravenous bees. Filicudi, 27 miles away, is a smudge on the horizon, wearing a dollop of scudding cloud over its extinct volcano, Mount Fossa delle Felci, like an insouciant lace hat. 

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SOURCE: https://www.cntraveler.com/

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