Canicatti to Enna

May 24, 2018

This morning before breakfast, I went out to the garden to look for Squittina the turtle. I noticed a little little slate box in the flower bed and checked inside and, wouldn’t you know it? She was inside with her head tucked into the back corner. I’ve never given much thought as to a turtle’s intelligence, but seeing her tucked in her made me think twice. I left her to sleep.

Carmelo served us a complete breakfast of fresh fruit, yogurt, juice, cappuccino, cheese and ham, boiled eggs, sweet cakes, cookies and bread. Before setting off, we gathered outside the B&B for a picture for his facebook page. Social media is very important in this business and we are asked by most hosts to do a review on Booking.com to help the attract customers.

Little Squittina took refuge from the cats in her tiny stone casa

Carmelo and his brother did all the designs for the B&B, including this art that framed a small but ancient piece of pottery.

This enormous tuba hung on the stone wall in the breakfast room.

Carmelo runs the Al Qatta B&B in Canicatti.

We made our way down the cobbled street and stopped at a small grocery store before leaving town to pick up some fruit and salted nuts as snacks for the road. David emerged with the goods and explained how to buy fresh produce here. It all comes down to plastic. First, you don your plastc gloves, then you select your items and place each type of produce in its own plastic bag. Next you weigh each item and apply a sticker with the price to the plastic bag. For two bananas, two oranges and two apricots, you get 3 plastic bags and a fourth to pack all of your items at the checkout. Now I realize we are in plastic overload at home, but this was overkill and there was no getting out of it. If you could only see how Sicily is drowning in garbage, you would appreciate how futile it is. It is another complicated subject here and is a problem they are not likely to overcome anytime soon.

Main street in the ‘new’ city was wide and bustling as we left town.

Here’s how you shop...with plastic galore.

Homeowners lower their garbage to the street by rope and hook. They also receive deliveries this way.

Once we were on the open road, we headed for Enna. The terrain was mostly rolling hills and gentle wide valleys draped in vineyards and fields of wheat. We travelled on small but adequate roads that were lightly travelled and the temperature was in the mid 20’s. It was an ideal cycle touring morning.

The land here was being actively farmed. Vineyards looked healthy and lush under the covers.

Underneath all those flowers they have planted some sort of pea. I assume it’s done for nitrogen fixing.

At the small village of Delia, we were doing some map checking to be sure we would emerge from town on the correct road, when a gentleman approached to ask if we needed directions. We asked him if our planned route would work. He told us to hold on for a minute as he was waiting for his wife. When she arrived he motioned for us to follow them in their car...and off we went. We followed him this way and that for about 750m and then he waved us on and they both bid us good luck. They’d led us exactly where we needed to be. The kindness of strangers is a beautiful thing.

We rode along on a small road and at Caltinisetta, we pulled in at a pasticceria for a lunch of calzone and sfincionello (sicilian pizza by the slice) and lemonades, with coffee and hazelnut gelatos to finish off. As we left town we had stunning views of the countryside because Caltanisetta is on the top of a hill. Our little road out of town descended down the spine of a ridge for a very long way before flattening out.

We coasted at about 40 kmh down this hill.

Soon after that, the gps started beeping at us to make a left turn. It was puzzling because it was directing us onto a tractor trail. We checked out our roadway only to discover that it dead ended not far down the way. We had to make a decision: go ahead on the trail or climb back up about 500’ to take the major highway. We knew the trail would eventually exit somewhere so we went for it. Soon enough, the tractor trail dumped us into an open field then it carried on through heavy grass and shrubs. I kept telling myself it was our camino, and with the right attitude it would be fine.

Bike handling skills are mandatory for this sport.

Lucky for us, it was dry. We could see from the heavy tractor ruts and hoof marks it had been a mucky quagmire earlier in the spring. The vegetation got thicker and thicker. After about an hour of bush crashing the gps advised us to turn left up a dirt track that went skyward at about 24% grade. That would have been nuts but if called for.... you do what you have to do. David did some recon on foot and reported that if we crossed a small creek, there was a semblance of a road not far ahead. We heave ho-ed the bikes for about 30m and eventually came out on a rough driveway being guarded by a couple of parched dogs. We bumbled along the driveway for 500m and came to a highway. By now, we were drenched in sweat and hot. We did not have adequate water for the remainder of the ride so we were rationing it.

The highway had a good surface but as it turned out, the remaining 17km to Enna was all uphill. We pedalled on under the afternoon sun and after awhile we stopped at a pullout to cool down in the shade of a tree. We noticed a small motorhome with french license plates pull in behind us. I approached the van with my water bottle in hand and just then, the gentleman emerged with a large jug of water for us. There’s a good chance he was a cyclist and knew we would be in need of water. How kind and thoughtful!

We arrived at the foot of Enna at about 5pm and pulled in at a bar for a refreshing cold lemonade. Enna sits strategically at the very top of two steep hills. Our final assignment of the day was the steep climb of about 3km to reach our B&B at the top. Once we located the B& B, we were met by a lovely young woman, Laura, who led us to our room on the 4th floor of the building.

This B&B is a family business. We met Laura’s father while we were loading our luggage to the room. The two were of them were heading out together to do some shopping. She had just spent the day with her 91yr old grandmother. Fortunately, her brother is a recent engineering grad and he had devised and built a carriage and electric pulley in the center of the stairwell so we just dropped our bags in the carriage and they travelled all the way to the 4th floor where we picked them up.

Our room was spacious and had views over the rooftops of Enna. Laura took us up to the top terrace for a cool drink. It was quite a reward for all the hard work we had done today.

After a rest and cleanup we strolled the nearby streets. Dimner was another fabulous pasta meal at a local trattoria. You can’t visit Sicily without developing a great respect fot all the different tyes of pasta and pasta sauces. I only hope I can re-create some of these dishes when I return home.

Beautiful fountain in Enna, without water. Few fountains have water.

From the belvedere, we had a spectacular view towards Catania. We caught our first view of Mt Etna from here, but due to the high cloud and haze it doesn’t show up very well in the photo.

View from Enna of an adjacent hilltop town.

The top of Mt. Etna is visible in this photo, just below the cloud.

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Today's ride: 68 km (42 miles)
Total: 436 km (271 miles)

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Scott AndersonWhat an epic ride! We didn’t go this route, but I’ll make note of it for our return tour. Congratulations for making it to the top of the world!
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5 years ago

Anne MathersWe knew it was a long steep climb to the town at then end of a hard day, but didn’t realize until we saw this view just how high we were. It really was way up there!
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5 years ago