Rome and Palermo

Immigration (passport control ) is always at your first point of entry to Schengen
So if you fly to Germany first that’s where it will be

Customs would be wherever you exit into Italy
And is nothing more than walking thru correct door unless you have something to declare

If the 2 flights are booked on separate tickets then yes you’d have to retrieve and recheck bags

I’d caution you to be careful about booking a flight to Palermo on same day
If your flight from NY or Germany is delayed you miss the next
Are you willing to risk that and eat the cost?
You might consider doing Rome first then Palermo
Then back to Rome for a 1 night stay before returning to US the next morning

“If your flights were booked under separate tickets, you will need to collect your bags and recheck them before your connecting flight.”

And you don’t go through customs in Germany, you go through passport control when entering from the US and connecting on.

Flights to and from Sicily seem to be sparse, slightly erratic, and variable in price.

I doubt there is any direct flight from US, so you would land somewhere in EU, and go through border control. Of course you should check, but I would bet that a flight from the US to Palermo with a layover will be much more expensive than a roundtrip to Milan or Rome, then buying a secondary roundtrip to Palermo.

You can also fly to Palermo or Catania from Rome or Milan. These flights are cheap and frequent - many each day - and only take an hour or so. Although they might leave from a different airport. For example, I flew to Malpensa (Milan) then flew to Catania from Linarte (Milan) which would probably take a 90 minutes to be on the safe side to change airports.

I believe there is an overnight ferry from the port near Rome to Palermo too. I know for a fact there is one from Naples (1 hour south of Rome). You leave out 9 pm and arrive in Palermo at sunrise - either a private room with beds and private bath, or save money sleeping on the "theatre" seats.

The Catania airport is only a 4eu bus ride of 10 minutes into the city. The Palermo airport is essentially a few cities over and is a slid 45 minute train costing about 12 eu if I recall (could be wrong though). You can also arrive in Catania and leave from Palermo or vice versa. I think it takes about 6 hours by train to get between the two of them - although you pass some wonderful places to stop such as Taormina and Cefalu.

Thank you for all responses. Very Helpful.

Jean

If you book a round trip from Rome or Milan to Sicily (assuming the airlines servicing that route sell round-trip tickets) and you miss the initial flight to Sicily, the return ticket will probably be cancelled automatically.