Eastern Sicily in 9 days

I've been to most of the areas you plan to visit (not Agrigento) but not to a lot of the specific sights, so I can't help you there. Just a couple of comments:

• I don't think you need a car until Day 5 for the trip to Noto, and even that can be done by bus (a bit over an hour) or train (a bit over 30 minutes). You'd need to check the schedules to verify that there's a late enough return trip to mesh with your plans. Noto is relatively small, though. It will not require a huge amount of time unless you want to have dinner there.

I don't see any advantage to having a rental car simply to drive from Catania to Siracusa. The train takes about 75 minutes. On the current schedule there are departures at 5:22, 6:35 and 8:36 PM. Ortygia's usually considered the place to stay in Siracusa, and I don't know that you'd be able to take a car into that area. I did see cars there, but it's on a peninsula and thus a vehicular dead-end. I wouldn't be surprised if it's a ZTL that's open only to residents.

• I'd make Ragusa my base for Scicli and Modica. They are all attractive places, but you'll need a lot more time for Ragusa.

Edited to add:

I would not want to stop for sightseeing with luggage in the car. It's risky even if you have a totally enclosed trunk, leave nothing visible, and do not wait until you reach the parking spot to put things in the trunk (potential thieves could be watching). This advice is not Sicily-specific; it is tourist-area specific. If you decide to take the chance, travel with a collapsible tote bag or day-pack so you can carry around with you all your valuable gear (prescription meds as well as electronic devices) rather than leaving hard-to-replace items the car while you sightsee. Not that it would be fun to replace your entire travel wardrobe, either.

Thanks for your reply. The reason I would rent a car in Siracusa, as I will come back with a car from Agrigento and if I pick it up in Siracusa for example, I have to pay one way fee which is about 100 euro (3 days of renting price at least). Our first plan was to plan 6 days in Sicily and 4 in Calabria and because of the huge amount of one way fee and ferry cost we decided to stay in Sicily.

I wasn't thinking about a drop charge. That does change the economics of the situation.

Few comments:

• Definitely go to Taormina by bus. The bus drops you off very close to the main gate. The train is not faster, they only go about 30 mph, and the stop is Giardini-Naxos/Taormina which is all the way down the hill.

• I wouldn't combine Taormina with Mt. Etna since you're already covering Taormina on the prior day. The tour you pick of Mt. Etna depends on how much of Mt. Etna you want to see; there is variation in the tours on how much you hike, whether you stop at a winery, etc.

• Logistically, it doesn't make sense to split the day in Day 5 to use for Noto, since Noto is on the way to all the towns you have listed on Day 6. If you go to Noto on Day 5, you're shortchanging time in Siracusa and then there's the 1 hour backtracking you'd have to do. Leave Noto for your first stop on Day 6.

• For Days 6 and 7- organize your sightseeing logically so there is little backtracking. Noto and then Ispica come up first on the road from Siracusa. Ragusa and Modica are very close together, with Ragusa being the furthest out. I don't think there's much worth seeing in Pozzalo and it's out of the way (Scicli is as well). A map will guide you how to hit the towns you want to see in a logical order. Things always take longer to see than you expect so 2 days to see all you have listed means compromising on what to see in those places. For example, Ragusa took me a whole day that I expected to also accommodate Modica, but then again I was traveling by train so that mode was less efficient than car.

Could all of you tell me which guide books and websites you use for your Sicily trip research. Thanks!

Thanks Agnes for your comments:

The reason I put Noto at the end of day 5 is that I heard those streets look the best in dusk in early evening and would be nice there. Yes, there is a little backtracking but nothing much.

So then I would have two days for Ispica, Scicli, Modica and Ragusa and two nights in Ragusa (+a morning).

There is a big hesitation of me between backtracking and being safe or visiting sites as we are going by car logically (as you pointed out). Of course the latter would be with our luggages in the car which does not sound that good in Sicily.

So in these cities I will rather backtrack.

The bigger decision will came in the situation of Villa Romana and Caltagirone as they are a LOT farther than either Ragusa or Agrigento.

Anyone know a safe parking place we could use in these two sights to be safe?

Peter

Others have highly recommended the BestOfSicily website for its very useful links. I think I used a Lonely Planet guidebook in addition to the "Sicily" section of Rick's Italy book. I imagine Rough has a good guide to Sicily as well.

You're right, Noto does have a lovely golden glow as the sun is beginning to set, but it's beautiful nonetheless. I was more concerned that you won't have enough time in Siracusa. My own trip and time spent in Siracusa felt rushed. I took an afternoon to eve to see Noto, so that sliced off half a day from Siracusa.

I, too, left Siracusa feeling that I hadn't done it justice, as a result of using it as a base for the small towns you are planning to visit. The archaeological park and museum are not tiny, and they are not in Ortygia, so you will spend time (or money in the form of taxis) getting to them. Ortygia itself is pretty large.

We will arrive in Ortigia around 8-9 PM and we will live next to the Theatre really close to the duomo and Castle. So the next day we are really close to them and we have a full day + night. I thought the Siracusa part can get done from 10 am to 5 pm the day after to leave for Noto. It still maybe less then needed, however the next day we can visit some sights before leaving to the Ragusa region if we feel like we missed out. :)

Siracusa has a big parking garage on Ortigia just past the bridge from the newer town, near the daily market.

1. Never rent a car in Sicily. We did in 2014. Big mistake. Buses and trains are fantastic and cheap and give you quiet relaxed time to enjoy the landscape of this beautiful country.
2. From Catania you can take the 8:15 am public bus roundtrip to Mt Etna (returns at 4:30 pm) for approx €8. Only one bus per day. When you get up to Mt Etna it's approx €90 for the gondola, tram, geologist tour. Bring a small picnic lunch and snack sitting on the crater. You don't need to go with a tour company.
3. Lonely Planet Sicily book. RS is publishing a Sicily book this year.
4. You've got too many towns on your itinerary. You'll have more fun if you move around less.

Angelina, lots of people rent cars in Sicilia. Roads are good and cars are faster than most trains or buses.

Why advise someone to "never" do something? Your experience is singular, as is everyone else's.

I will rent a car for sure. I dont want to soend hours on the trains and buses especially with luggages. I heard that it is also tough to navigate yourself by public transportation, especially on the south.

Actually it's not that tough to navigate by public transportation. The buses are real nice, they look like coach buses and are comfortable and clean and pretty much on time. And the fares are really inexpensive. The regional trains are a bit slow but that's how I got to interact with the locals (no English was spoken). Fun experience. Ease is not an issue, it's more to do with flexibility (especially on Sundays when frequencies are lower). Honestly, until say Day 6, a car isn't even that much of an advantage. It's a big advantage if you're cramming a lot of things in or stopping in some smaller places along the way.

I did notice the lack of traffic in between cities (I was traveling as north as Taormina and as far west as Ragusa). I would have had no problem driving, it wouldn't be stressful at all. But the city centers were crazy and I was glad I didn't have a car to deal with then.

I was in Sicily with a friend in April-May of 2014, so almost three years ago (hard for me to believe), and of the places you're interested in, went to Taormina, Siracusa, Noto, and Ragusa. My VERY detailed trip report is here: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/sicily-palermo-caltanisetta-siracusa-taormina

We had no particular trouble with driving (details in my report). My friend later rented a car on a trip to England, and he said that driving in England was FAR harder than driving in Sicily.

At least in 2014, Ortigia had a ZTL, but it operated on weekends rather than weekdays. Furthermore, it was very well labeled, and there was a clear turn-off to the parking lots on the island to avoid the ZTL. We used Parcheggio Talete; if you look for this on Google Maps, you'll see that it's at the northern tip of Ortigia, and it's outside the ZTL.

As for luggage at stops, our car was a hatchback and had a cover over the luggage area. We were worried that it did not have an enclosed trunk, until we saw that all the other cars didn't either. We did follow the advice to never touch the luggage area at the parking lot (in other words, if we were going to need something on arrival, we had it in the passenger compartment, so we didn't have to open the trunk at the parking area where someone could see what was in it, or indeed the fact that anything was in it).

As for visiting Mt. Etna, go on a day when the weather is clear. Just as they always say about visiting the Alps, mountains make their own weather, and mountain weather is both unpredictable and changeable. I didn't get to go, because on the day we had allotted for it the weather did not cooperate.