Welcome to Sicily. On arrival at Catania airport you will be met and transferred privately to your hotel, with the rest of the day free.Catania sits at the foot of Mount Etna and has been rebuilt from the volcano’s own stone more than once. The result is a baroque city in black lava set against pale limestone, and the historic centre is UNESCO listed. Depending on your arrival time, Duomo Square and the streets around it are a short walk from most of the centre.Dinner tonight is at your own arrangement and the evening is at leisure. Your tour leader joins the group tomorrow morning.Special InformationArrival airport transfers are included as part of your package. You will be met on arrival at Catania airport and transferred privately to your hotel.If Inspiring Vacations has not provided your international airfares, please ensure you provide your flight details via your Traveller Hub portal no later than 90 days prior to travel so that your transfers can be confirmed.If you are arriving early and have made your own arrangements prior to your tour commencing, airport transfers will not be included.

This morning after breakfast meet your tour leader and the rest of your group for a welcome meeting and brief of the day’s activities.Depart for Syracuse, one of the great cities of the ancient Greek world. The Neapolis Archaeological Park holds the Greek Theatre, among the largest and best preserved anywhere, the Roman Amphitheatre, and the Latomie del Paradiso, the old stone quarries that built the city. The Ear of Dionysius is a tall limestone cave cut into the quarry wall, with an acoustic that carries a whisper the length of it.Cross to Ortigia, the small island at the heart of old Syracuse, where the cathedral was built into the columns of a Greek temple to Athena and the Doric shafts still stand in the walls. Walk the baroque streets down to the harbour and the Arethusa Fountain. Lunch today is at your own arrangement.In the afternoon continue to Noto, rebuilt in golden limestone after the earthquake of 1693 and the finest baroque town in Sicily, before carrying on to Ragus.Inspiring HighlightsNeapolis Archaeological Park, SyracuseGreek Theatre and Roman AmphitheatreEar of DionysiusOrtigiaNotoSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 3 hours.Today involves a good deal of walking, on uneven ground at the archaeological park and on cobbles in Ortigia and Noto.

After breakfast, begin in Ragusa Ibla, the lower and older half of the town. Rebuilt after the 1693 earthquake, it packs more than fifty churches into a small space, with the Giardino Ibleo at its far end and baroque palaces lining the lanes between. Television viewers may recognise it as the setting for Inspector Montalbano.Continue to Modica, a town built up the sides of a gorge and known for a chocolate made by a cold method brought from Mexico by the Spanish, which leaves the sugar crystals unmelted and the texture grainy. There is a stop and a tasting at Sabadì, one of the best known producers, followed by a light lunch at the Orti di San Giorgio.In the afternoon the road climbs inland to Piazza Armerina and the Villa Romana del Casale, a fourth century Roman villa buried by a landslide and uncovered in the twentieth. Its floors carry the largest and best preserved collection of Roman mosaics in the world. Continue to Agrigento for dinner and overnight. Today covers a lot of ground and travel times are an estimate affected by traffic.Inspiring HighlightsRagusa IblaModica and the Sabadì chocolate tastingVilla Romana del CasaleSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 4 hours.Ragusa Ibla and Modica are both built on slopes, with cobbled and stepped lanes throughout.

After breakfast, visit the Valley of the Temples, which is neither a valley nor entirely temples but a ridge above the sea carrying the remains of ancient Akragas. The Temple of Concordia is among the best preserved Greek temples anywhere, standing almost complete because it was converted into a church in the sixth century. The Temple of Juno sits at the high end of the ridge and the Temple of Hercules is the oldest of the group.Continue west to Marsala, where Garibaldi landed with his thousand volunteers in 1860 and began the campaign that unified Italy. The town’s other export is its fortified wine. At the Florio cellars you walk between the nineteenth century vats still used for ageing, visit three of the cellars, and sit down to a light lunch accompanied by the wines produced there.The last stop is the Salt Road, where shallow pans and low windmills run along the lagoon towards the island of Stagnone, and salt has been worked since Phoenician times. Continue to Palermo for the evening, with dinner at your own arrangement. This is the longest driving day of the tour and travel times are an estimate affected by traffic.Inspiring HighlightsValley of the Temples, AgrigentoFlorio wine cellars and tasting, MarsalaThe Salt Road and the Stagnone lagoonSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 5 hours.The Valley of the Temples is an open archaeological site with little shade and a good deal of walking on gravel paths. A hat, sunscreen and water are advisable from May to September.

After breakfast, drive up to Monreale on the hillside above Palermo for the Arab-Norman cathedral. Its interior carries around six thousand square metres of Byzantine gold mosaic, the largest such scheme in Italy, and the cloister alongside has more than two hundred paired columns with no two capitals the same.Return to Palermo, a city built in layers by Phoenicians, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Spaniards and Bourbons, each leaving something behind. Visit the cathedral, which carries Norman, Gothic and baroque work in a single facade, the Martorana with its twelfth century mosaics, and the Cappella Palatina inside the Norman Palace, where a Byzantine mosaic scheme sits beneath an Arab wooden ceiling. Lunch is taken with local products.The afternoon is a walk through the historic centre, taking in the Teatro Massimo, the largest opera house in Italy, and the Pretoria fountain, a Renaissance piece bought from Florence and installed here to some local scandal. Inspiring HighlightsMonreale Cathedral and CloisterPalermo CathedralThe MartoranaCappella PalatinaTeatro MassimoSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 1 hour.Monreale and the Palermo churches all require shoulders and knees to be covered. A light scarf or wrap is worth carrying.

After breakfast, leave Palermo for Cefalù, a fishing town beneath a great rock on the north coast. Its Norman cathedral was begun in 1131 and the Christ Pantocrator in the apse is among the finest Byzantine mosaics in Sicily. There is free time to walk the cobbled lanes and the old washhouse, or to visit the Mandralisca Museum and its Antonello da Messina portrait. Lunch is in a local restaurant.Continue to Catania for a walk through the historic centre, which is baroque in a way no other city is, built in black lava from Etna set against pale limestone. Duomo Square holds the cathedral of Sant’Agata and the elephant fountain that is the symbol of the city, carved from lava and topped with an Egyptian obelisk.From there the route runs up to University Square and along Via dei Crociferi, a short street carrying four churches and the monastery of San Benedetto, and finishes with a tasting of granita and brioche, which is how Sicilians eat breakfast through the summer. Dinner is at your own arrangement. Travel times today are an estimate affected by traffic.Inspiring HighlightsCefalù CathedralMandralisca MuseumCatania historic centre and Duomo SquareGranita and brioche tastingSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 4 hours.

After breakfast there is a short visit to the Catania fish market, the pescheria, which fills the streets behind Duomo Square each morning with swordfish, sea urchins and a great deal of shouting.The road then climbs Mount Etna, at 3,350 metres the highest active volcano in Europe and still regularly in eruption. The coach reaches Rifugio Sapienza on the southern side, where you walk out to the Silvestri Craters, two cones formed in the eruption of 1892 and quiet since. The ground is black ash and the views run down to the sea. A stop at a beekeeping farm on the slopes includes a tasting of local honey and other produce.The day finishes in Taormina, on a terrace high above the coast, where the Greco-Roman theatre frames Etna and the sea between its columns and remains the best known view in Sicily. Lunch is in a restaurant in the old town, with free time afterwards along Corso Umberto before returning to Catania. Dinner is at your own arrangement. Travel times today are an estimate affected by traffic and by conditions on the mountain.Inspiring HighlightsCatania fish marketMount Etna and the Silvestri CratersHoney tasting at a beekeeping farmTaormina Greco-Roman TheatreSpecial InformationYour travel time today will be approximately 4 hours.Mount Etna is at altitude and is considerably colder and windier than the coast in any season. Bring a warm layer and a windproof jacket, and closed walking shoes with grip for the ash underfoot. Snow can lie on the upper slopes into spring.Please note - your tour leader’s services end this evening.

After breakfast, check out of your hotel. A private transfer will collect you and take you to Catania airport, where your tour comes to an end.Take with you the memory of a circuit of Sicily, from the Greek theatres of Syracuse and the temples above Agrigento to the mosaics of Monreale, the salt pans of Marsala and the black slopes of Etna.Thank you for travelling with Inspiring Vacations. We hope you had a memorable experience.Special InformationDeparture transfers are included as part of your package. You will be collected from your hotel at the appropriate time and transferred privately to Catania airport to meet your flight. The pick-up time will depend on the flight you have booked.If you choose to extend your stay this included service will be forfeited and no refund will be issued.If Inspiring Vacations has not provided your international airfares, please ensure you provide your flight details via your Traveller Hub portal no later than 90 days prior to travel so that your transfers can be confirmed.