Sicily air travel

We were on the RS Sicily tour in April 2016. We spent a couple of days in Rome on the way, then took a separate flight on Alitalia to Palermo the day before the tour started. At the end of the tour, we flew from Catania to Rome on Alitalia, spent a night in Rome, and then flew home. This arrangement after the tour avoided an early morning departure from Sicily.

Milan also has numerous flights to Sicily, but we thought Rome would be more fun.

We used Aer Lingus to fly from the US to Rome. The flights plus hotel cost in Rome was less than other options that involved getting from the US to Sicily without stopping over.

Pippa, you are correct— there is no easy route. We took this tour last year and added a few days and another location on either end of our tour. You can really pick anywhere on the continent to spend a few days to decompress. Then use skyscanner.net to get tickets to Palermo at your leisure. Trying to connect to Palermo on your day of arrival to the continent can be very tricky and a very couple of days of travel.

The tour is truly worth it! You will have such a great time.

We had the same plan as Bob on our recent tour of Sicily. The only difference was we did not spend a night in Rome on the return. We were really lucky that there was no delay in our flight from Catania back to Rome since we were connecting with a Delta flight back to Atlanta from Rome. Only two hours to change! It all worked out fine and the separate tickets on Alitalia were much cheaper than trying to booked all the way through on Delta. Sicily is a wonderful adventure and hope you have gorgeous weather as we did! There is always something to discover in Rome. If you plan to visit the Vatican Museums or the Borghese, do booked your tickets/ reservation online ahead. Borghese was one of my favorite stops in Rome! We had been to Rome many times but it always surprises.

The only non stop flight to Europe from PDX is, I believe, to Amsterdam AMS, and seasonally, to London LHR, both with Delta. KLM, which is a Delta partner in the sky team, flies from AMS to Catania CTA, Sicily’s largest airport.

The most convenient way to fly to Sicily on the same day is, therefore, a Delta/KLM codeshare from PDX to CTA with one layover stop in AMS. I don’t know if that would work in terms of prices and feasibility of connections, because I haven’t checked, but you can check for yourself in the Delta website.

All other options from PDX require 2 layovers. You can also go from a European gateway to Sicily using one of the many low cost airlines that fly there, but since that would be in a separate ticket, it is best to have a day extra layover at that gateway at each end of the trip.

We flew to Rome and spent time there before the tour. We then flew Ryanair to Palermo. From Catania we flew Ryanair to Pisa to explore there and Siena. We took a train to Rome to fly home. We had a good experience with Ryanair and it was very inexpensive. We paid extra so our carryon was guaranteed to be onboard, we could pick our seats and we could check in 60 days ahead of the flight. I think we paid only 100 euros for the two of us for each flight. The flight was on time.

Condor Airlines PDX (Portland) to FRA (Frankfurt) non-stop twice a week....currently Tuesdays and Saturdays.
I've never flown Condor, but I know people who have - with good reviews.

Pippa,

As others have mentioned, you can fly into another city you’re interested in exploring, then fly to Palermo, and do the same for the return flight.

It’s been my experience that flights to/from Milan cost less than those to/from Rome.

I did not take the Sicily tour, but I recently flew to Milan, spent a couple of nights, then flew to Palermo on EasyJet.
I then flew back to Milan from Catania, also via EasyJet.

If you choose to fly EasyJet, do consider paying extra for an “up front” extra legroom seat, which entitles you to an additional under seat bag (besides the ONE carry-on allowance , and priority boarding.

Have a wonderful trip, Sicily is amazing!🌼

Hi Pippa:

Yes, Portland is not the easiest airport to fly out of to Europe. We did almost the identical thing last year that Priscilla did. Into Milan for a couple of days (mainly to finally see the Last Supper), then EasyJet to Catania (joined a tour - not RS) and then ended with a couple of days in Palermo and flew EasyJet back to Milan.

We highly recommend a couple of days on the front end somewhere to adjust to the time change. We just happen to like Milan, and the Last Supper and a favorite restaurant gave us the reason to stop there. We also had quite a favorable experience with EasyJet - and as Priscilla noted - do consider paying extra for the up-front extra legroom seat, etc.

Hope you enjoy Sicily as much as we did.

Hi Pippa
I'm sort of in the same boat as you. I'm flying from Boise. Im going from Boise to Chicago to Rome. Since I arrive first thing in the morning i could then take Ryanair to catania. But I'm going to spend the day in Rome and fly down the next day.

Thank you all so much. Will do some research. We have spent time in Rome and Milan and seen all the wonderful sights mentioned in these posts. We a,lways fly direct to Amsterdam but will look at LHR and then on a cheap airline. These multi flights that are needed for RS tours are always a challenge!
Thank you all again. Pippa

If it's any comfort, even coming from New York (where we are spoiled with nonstop flights to all kinds of European cities), it's a bit complicated to get to Sicily! There are no nonstops, and some flights require airport changes (e.g., Paris CDG to Paris Orly), so they don't work well. It's certainly easier than from Portland, but it's still not "easy" compared to many other places.

We flew from San Francisco to London. Had a quick great fun time for 2 days and then took Easy Jet. Yes and I agree buy the upfront tickets for the additional bag.