Who are we? |
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Who are we? |
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Well, ok, we are crazy. It is necessary to be crazy to take one week of vacation and the plane tickets three days before the departure. But you will see, that was worth the sorrow of it.
So, here we go from Brussels towards Palermo early saturday
morning ; We would have preferred to land at Catania, but the charters were complete. A
beautiful sight on the Mount Blanc recalls us that we go in mountain, even if there is no
snow yet on the Etna.
Bus, bus and bus again, we arrive at Catania, then Nicolosi where we make our food
provisions for three days. We will need complete autonomy: in addition to water and the
bread, we take ham, Parmesan, sicilian sausage... miam, one salivates about it in advance.
Etna is in the clouds, but at the Youth Hostel, they announce it clear and uncloudy for the following day.
And there, after a good night, the volcano appears finally at us. We will await the bus which must go up there towards 09h00. Nicolosi, if calm yesterday, is suddenly taken in a storm by a column of Jeeps, 4x4, motor bikes... We begin to dream: they heard about an important side eruption, and they run to see. But not, it is Sunday and it is the attraction of the area! It promises for loneliness and calm it mountain...
Bus, cable car and bus 4x4 bring us here in Torre Del Filosofo,
terminus for the tourists, and fatherland of the guides of Etna. We discuss a little with
the sympathetic chief guide Antonio Nicoloso, then we move away towards the 1971 cone, to
the west.
At midday, our base camp is installed on ash and under a very blue sky, far from the tourists, and the serious things can start.
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Back to Boulevard de Dixmude