Advice on my planned trip to Sicily 2025!

We absolutely love Catania and base ourselves there every trip. The people, the food, the grittiness - it's the real Sicily. I think you'll get your fill of beauty from Taormina, Cefalu, and a day trip to Ortigia. Catania is a great contrast to that, and I think you'd benefit from the balance.

Adding: What if you did the wine excursion from Taormina and then the Etna excursion from Catania? Don't miss Etna!

That is a thought, i will say the wife is more into beauty vs grit which was leaning me to go toward Ortiga as the base. I do however see alot of day trips to ortiga tour wise from catania.

is there an area of Catania that isnt "gritty" per say? When we stayed in Rome we stayed near villa Borghese to avoid being near the centers grittiness i guess youd call it.

Catania + Siracusa is too much given your schedule.
We did 4 nights in Ortigia and 5 in Catania.
Really liked both.
Don’t waste time in transit.

We also enjoyed Catania --- considerably more than Ortigia which was a bit too tourist-oriented for us. We stayed near the Teatro Antico in Catania and loved eating at the nearby Antica Putia Odeon restaurant. So much good food in Catania, but I've lost track of the other restaurant names. The WWII museum, going to the opera, the street market that is north of the more famous ones — it has various names, but del Carmine is one. From Catania you could visit Randazzo or Etna or a winery. Is it a beautiful city? It's jumbled together beauty and weirdness and ugliness --- full of surprises (like, you can't even see the amphitheater I mentioned from the street because buildings were built up around it).

I hope you are going to Monreale and will see not only the mosaics in the basilica but also the cloisters (especially the carved tops of all the columns --- each one is a different scene with Bible stories, nudes cavorting, mermaids, owl-people, flowers and vines, etc.).

We stayed 2 nights in Catania and 1 night in Taormina, with a day trip from Catania to Ortigia. This itinerary worked well for our interests; 2 nights in Taormina would have been too much. Info on our activities is in our trip report (part 2): https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/italy-2019-sicily-sorrento-amalfi-pompeii-rome-orvieto-tuscany-siena-florence-cinque-terre-milan

I'll add a couple of suggestions based on our recent 3 1/2 week Sicily/Amalfi vacation. From Palermo, you may want to consider heading south to Sciacca to visit the Valle Dei Templi in Agrigento on your way to Taormina. This was an amazing stop for us, and we combined it with a winery tour at Planeta Winery; one of the best winery tours we have taken. Or, if you want to keep the same travel plan and just fill out day 7 and 8, then I would simply stay another 2 days in Taormina and road trip to Mt. Etna and Siracusa. That's what we did, and the ride to Catania airport from Taormina was very reasonable. On one of your extra days, you could do as we did; we hired a driver for the day that took us to the Mt. Etna guided tour via 4x4 vehicles which included lunch and a wonderful winery tour at the base of Mt. Etna. The other day could be a day trip to Siracusa and Ortigia, another wonderful excursion and full day which included a tour of their fabulous Archaeological Park of Neapolis and the old town of Ortigia.

My final suggestion is to sign up for a cooking class in Taormina; there are many options available. Our cooking class was in Taormina in a beautiful Sicilian home, overlooking the sea with an outstanding chef. The actual home was previously rented by DH Lawrence and Truman Capote during their travels to Sicily and the photos of that time were amazing. Plus, the meal was a highlight of our trip.

We fell in love with Sicily and can't wait to go back. I hope you have the same experience!

You have almost no time in Palermo itself.
I love Catania and have stayed a few times on every recent trip to Sicily. I find it a gloriously beautiful city just pulsing with life and the percentage of tourists to locals is low as compared to Siracusa and, certainly Taormina.

I'd skip Taormina if you want to see both Siracusa and Catania.
I think Etna is a lot more magical than just a visit to a winery, and Gambino seems to be a focus of many tour groups so I don't know fi you would get the intimate experience you would have at a smaller place less oriented toward tourists. That one is even a destination for Viator. If you are a real wine lover, why don't you try to visit a winery who produces some of your favorites (??). If your budget allows, you could hire a driver to take you there, and also visit Etna up to a certain point, on the same day, depending on the location of the winery.

Are you renting a car at all?
Hiring private drivers? (We've done both, recently)

But since you fly out of Catania, spend the last few nights there and leave Siracusa for another time.