We stayed at the Hotel Sporting Baia, very nice and RIGHT on the beach! From here we went on excursions to Taormina, an ancient Greek city with some of the oldest ruins in Sicily, and also to Mt. Etna, a VERY much still active volcano - which managed to erupt rather impressively again just 7 days after our visit. Lava was flowing and the mountain was steaming while we were there on the island. It is remarkable to me how calmly the people of the region deal with living at the foot of one of the largest active volcanoes in that part of the world! They say the mountain erupts every year, but only in a "big" way every 3-4 years! Looked pretty "big" to me... even with just a little lava oozing out!
Taormina is about 5 miles from Naxos and higher up so it afforded some great views back across the bay toward our hotel. Sicily is definitely a place I hope to return to someday. It's beautiful and the people are very friendly!
A view of Naxos from the city of Taormina. Our hotel is marked in the photo... double clickon the photo to see greater detail!
The view from my hotel window... the beach! Beautiful!
Just one of many gorgeous walkways in the the town of Taormina.
The ancient Greek theater of Taormina. At it's height this theater could seat 9000 spectators, and as you can see it's still in use today! They hold a major film festival here that rivals the one at Cannes in France!
My students climbing one of Mt. Etna's ash cones from the 2001 eruption. They are at the 6,500 ft. level on a 11.500 ft. volcano.
Mt. Etna by day... steaming both from its cone and from a lava flow some 1/3rd of the way down the
left side of the mountain.
Mt. Etna by day... steaming both from its cone and from a lava flow some 1/3rd of the way down theleft side of the mountain.
The lava flow glows eerily by night! This is slow moving, oozing sort of lava.. nothing to be concerned about according to the locals. However, 6 days later, Etna erupted again!
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