sicily

Sicily is a region larger than Massachusetts and Rhode Island combined, and there are many famous locations one could visit. 8 days are not enough to see everything, so you need to do some research on what you’d like to see. Generally to see cities like Palermo and Siracusa, a car is not necessary, but if you want to venture to locations like the Valley of the Temples, Segesta, Selinunte, Mt. Etna, Zingaro Reserve, Erice, Villa del Casale near Piazza Armerina, etc. then a car is advisable to visit those locations, since public transportation to rural places or smaller cities is not always very frequent or even available,

Take a look at the website below and see what might interest you

http://www.bestofsicily.com/

There is a good amount of information here - look under Plan for sample itineraries:

https://www.ricksteves.com/europe/italy/sicily

I went on the Rick Steves Sicily tour in May 2024. I thought the tour covered all the island's highlights except Ragusa and the other Baroque cities in southeastern Sicily. Using the Rick Steves' tour itinerary as a starting point for making your choices is a good idea.

I concur with Roberto and Elizabeth - more days and pay attention to the RS itinerary, but not a lot of time in Erice but Ortigia and Taormina are fantastic.

You can't use the timing of the Rick Steves tour as a guide, because the tour provides dedicated bus transportation. Sicily doesn't have fast trains for you to use.

I think you'll find there's no intercity bus service on Sundays.

With a car, a minimum of about 2 weeks is needed to see Sicily's widely scattered highlights.

With 7 to 9 days you need to focus on one part of the island. We spent nine nights on the east side for example. We stayed three nights in Taormina, four nights in Siracusa, and two nights in Ragusa.

With all due respect to RS, his Sicily book is one of his worst. It's fairly easy to do 2 days in Palermo, 1 day in Cefalu, 2 days in Taormina, 2 days in Siracusa, and then add some days in Catania, or Ragusa. Those other cool places with Greek ruins are not on the main train lines and not easy to get to.

You can take a nice overnight ferry from Naples to Palermo or Salerno to Catania. You can fly Vueling from Sicily to Barcelona, Istanbul, or other places. I don't recommend the train that crosses into Messina - a huge waste of time and not that scenic.

I took a week long tour of Sicily this past March that went-Palermo, Agrigento (Valley of the Temples), Piazza Armerina (to see the Villa Romana del Casale on way to Siracusa), Siracusa, and Taormina. I know it only scratched the surface but what I saw was outstanding and I throughly enjoyed myself. I’m more of a highlights traveller and prefer shorter trips so this worked well for me. BTW, late March was a delightful time of year to be there weather wise and things starting to bloom (almond trees).