At Catania: Loop ride to Mount Etna - Our tour of Sicily - CycleBlaze

May 11, 2016

At Catania: Loop ride to Mount Etna

GPS route

Today was a day with a pretty simple narrative - a loop ride from Catania to the base of the funicular on Mount Etna and back again. After a frustrating week of looking eastward in vain for a decent view of the mountain, we were looking forward to getting an up close look. The weather forecast was for clear skies, so we anticipated some impressive views.

First though, I had to attend to my rear brakes, which have gotten badly worn and don't really feel safe any more. While Rachael went off to find our lunch for the day, I squatted on the street and set about replacing the pads - one of the few maintenance tasks I feel reasonably confident at. After replacing them though, I discovered that I couldn't loosen the brakes to accomodate them because the end of the cable had gotten sheared off somewhere along the way.

We were just about to start inquiring about where to find a bike shop when an old gent who had been observing me walked up and started pantomiming directions for us. Following his advice, we ended up at a hole in the wall on a side alley, and my new best bike store anywhere. Twenty minutes later, we were on the road.

The climb begins immediately, and does not relent until we arrived at our destination - 25 miles of unbroken ascent. The first five miles or so we're through the sprawl of Catania, one of the less bike friendly cities we've visited.once we escaped the city though the remainder of the ride was quiet and quite enjoyable, but uphill all the way.

At first the sky was impenatrably hazy, so we couldn't see the mountain. I was confident though that once we got up a ways we would break out of it and we would enjoy fine views above the haze. I'm an incurable optimist, so I continued believing this almost all the way to the top. Finally, about a mile from our summit we saw (wrongly, we later realized) what we thought was the summit breaking through not far above us.

After refreshing ourselves a bit at a bar, we spent some time looking around, including a short walk up to the rim of Sylvestri, a small crater just off the highway. It was quite scenic (but still very hazy), but I'm sure what I'll remember best is the fierce winds that made walking all but impossible.

The start of the ride off the mountain was as you'd expect - fast and exhilarating for the next fifteen miles. Beyond Nicolosi though we returned to the sprawl of Catania - traffic jams, chaotic driving, confusion over directions. It's much worse going down, because everything occurs at a faster pace and because now it's evening rush hour and traffic is much worse, We engage our fish brains, going with the flow and being alert to activity on all sides, and make it down safely. We haven't really figured out a way through the central city yet, so the last mile or so are pretty maddening, trying to stay on pavement rather than lava pavers; trying to pick routes that don't dead-end into an arterial; trying to pick streets with less traffic but that actually go somewhere useful. It's an interesting exercise, but one we'd rather avoid. If we ever come back to Sicily (which we hope to do someday), we'll steer a wide berth past Catania.

Rachael's video clip for the day.

Total elevation gain: today, 6,400'; for the tour, 59,400'.

In Catania, replacing a pair of completely worn brake pads. Another crisis - I can't put on new ones because the end of the brake cable was sheared off so I can't open the calipers wide enough to accommodate them. We can hardly climb Mount Etna without brakes.
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Tucked in an alley two blocks away where we were directed by a helpful passerby, we found a small bike shop.
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They speak English, which helped a lot. Yes, we can take care of that - see you in two days. Heh, heh. Wonderful shop, wonderful atmosphere, wonderful service. New cable installed and on the road again 20 minutes later. Eight euros.
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A creative repurposing of old rims. The bike shop has a wide variety of beers and wines available for you to choose from while you wait.
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Setting out for Mount Etna from Catania, elevation 50'. Many of the streets in old Catania are paved with blocks of lava, which are even less pleasant to bike on than you might think.
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MountEtna@1000feet. Visibility one or two miles. No trace of the mountain to be seen. The lumps to the right are just small, nearby vents.
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Near Nicolosi, we come across another painted horse-drawn cart. I couldn't believe it when we ran across the first one a week or so ago.
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MountEtna@2000feet. Visibility about one or two miles. Still no sign of the mountain, but at least we're almost out of Catania's suburbs and the scenery is improving a bit.
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MountEtna@3000feet. Visibility one or two miles. We're in the lava zone, and the landscape is increasingly dramatic. We can see some foothills or minor vents in the near distance, but still not the top of the mountain.
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MountEtna@4000feet. Visibility one or two miles. No sign of the summit - everything in the distance is still buried under the haze. I pointed the camera up the road instead because the views were better.
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MountEtna@5000feet. Visibility one or two miles. We thought we were finally seeing the summit, but we're wrong. Looking at the map after we got back, I see that is still just another minor cone on the flank. We never did see the summit today. Also, this is the elevation I thought we were aiming for, but I had gotten my itinerary notes wrong. I've peaked too soon, and we still have another 1250' of climbing ahead.
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The profile of a tough but efficient climb: Distance 25.5 miles. Maximum elevation 6,243'. Total elevation gain 6,247'. Not much loss on the way up - since we started at about 50 feet above sea level, it's been virtually 100% up since we left our hotel. My apologies for not thinking to wash the salt off the device before taking a photo of it.
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The reward at the top: replenishing my potassium and yeast levels.
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This is one of the small craters above the base of the funicular. The diagonal line slanting across it is the path to its rim - if you zoom in, you can see climbers slowly trudging their way up.
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We walked up to Silvestri Crater instead - a much easier target - right beside the highway, with about a 100 meter walk to its rim.
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The winds at this elevation were ferocious whenever you we were in an open area. Wind-battered and ash-blasted on the lip of this small crater, it was all but impossible to hold the camera steady enough for a decent picture. I only stayed at the top for a minute or two before dropping down to a more sheltered spot.
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Looking down into Silvestri Crater, formed in 1986.
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Another small crater just north of Silvestri. There are dozens at least of these craters on the southeast slope of the mountain.
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Beginning the descent. With the snow poles, switchbacks and exposed terrain, it felt like beginning the descent from Mount Ventoux.
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At elevation about 4000' on the way down, we pass through a beautiful lacey forested zone. Some of the trees look like palo verde, the tree we see in the American southwest. I'll have to research its distribution to see if it could be the same thing.
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On the descent of Mount Etna: miles of lava stone walls.
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Today's ride: 53 miles (85 km)
Total: 828 miles (1,333 km)

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