sicily 6 day itinerary-driving, rental car?

This is a lot for six days. One idea:

Take train to Cefalu from PMO (2-3 hours) and spend one night. Rent car from there and drive to Taormina (2.5 hours). Spend 2 nights. Visit Mt Etna.

Drive back to Cefalu and drop car. Take train back to Palermo. Spend 3 nights.

Thank you! Did not think of this. What good ideas. We may stay in Cefalu one other night, not go to Taormina, just see Mt. Etna.

That’s a lot of going back and forth to the airport that is not that close to Palermo. The airport is west of the city and everything you want to visit is east of it. Maybe spend your arrival night by the airport, pick up the rental in the morning, then drive to the furthest site you want to visit. Then, work you way back.

When we were there with a rental car, rather than stay in Palermo we stayed in Monreale and took the bus into the city. In both Monreale and Taormina our lodgings had free parking.

If you are not set on Taormina, another idea is to stay in a town nearer to Mt. Etna. We ended up in Taormina but at one point were seriously considering Randazzo. However, the village of Linguaglossa is supposedly the best base to visit Mt. Etna as it is closer. I was at the time more interested in visiting wineries than Mt. Etna and thus the choice of Randazzo.

For a 5 day trip-what do others think about driving to Cefalu from the airport, spending two nights (this would be a necessary part of the itinerary), then in the morning driving to Mt. Etna, driving back to Palermo that same day/evening (dropping the car off at the airport), and then spending the last two days in Palermo? Is Mt. Etna doable with this plan?

I think this is too much. You would be better off renting a car in Cefalu and returning it there. The Palermo airport is quite a ways west of the city so really out of your way. Take train from airport to Cefalu.

Even then, it seems like you would need another night to spend closer to Mt Etna. But it would be better to return to Cefalu and take train to Palermo then to drive to airport and then take have to go to Palermo from there.

I think you could have a lovely time staying near Palermo the whole time.

Palermo, itself, has a lot to do. Then, in the area there’s Erice, Monreale, Cefalu’, Segesta, San Vito Lo Capo, Mondello, Monte Pellegrino. Mt. Etna is a unique experience, no doubt. But it is across the island and will make logistics somewhat complicated. It’s possible though. All I’m trying to say is that Palermo offers A LOT and you wouldn’t have to bounce around as much.

I agree about staying close by to Palermo! But-my son really wants to see Mt. Etna, so am trying to fit that in, too.

It is a good idea about car returns in Cefalu. I think driving to Mt. Etna early morning, spending a few hours, and then driving back to Cefalu, taking the train to Palermo seems not too onerous for one day. Busy, but possible?

You need to try to figure out how far it is to the North side of Mt. Etna. That is the side closest to Cefalu. It is not the side with the chair lift and buses with big wheels so you want to make sure that the north side would satisfy your son before planning your trip around this. We did a tour from Taormina to the north side. Linguaglossa I think is the nearest town. Goggle maps says just over 2 hours from Cefalu. Goggle maps tends to be optimistic so I would say 2.5 hours each way. So you have 5 hours of driving to just get in the area. I don't know how far it is then to the place you have to park and then hike.

There are tours that go from Cefalu to Mt Etna but the ones I saw also go to Taormina. They are 13 hours long. I saw some tours from Linguaglossa to Mt. Etna. They were 5 hours long. You could go without a tour but then you need to be careful not to get lost. I don't remember the trails being marked.

Those are all good points.
We would want to go to the south side, so will google that distance, to see if possible.