Thoughts about flying out of Catania after 2 weeks driving around Sicily

When we flew to Sicily from Dulles airport it was to and from Catania and we had no issues. Going to Sicily we had a layover in Munich and on the return the layover was in Frankfurt.

Assuming you are looking at Lufthansa/United? I fly Lufthansa often and you just want to have ample time for a Frankfurt layover, Munich not as bad. I would press on to Palermo and do my recovery there before driving.
Catania is a small airport and I always prefer that--sounds like a good plan!

Thanks to all for the thoughts. Yes, we will be flying United/Lufthansa, and had thought we might spend a few days in Munich enroute to Palermo.

We have flown out of both Palermo (to Edinburgh) and Catania (to Milano and onward to Brussels) without any issues.

I'm presuming that you'd rent a car at the Palermo airport, not in the city, and return it in Catania, so there may be extra drop-off charges (not all rental agencies charge, though).

I don't know how familiar you are with Palermo - you can take the train directly to the airport and pick up your car there. At the Catania airport the rental area is very close (walking distance) to the terminal.

Either Palermo or Catania are good. Both are great and efficient small/midsize airports. The choice should be dictated by your itinerary. Obviously Taormina is closer to Catania, so if the trip ends there Catania might make sense. Just to let you know occasionally Mt. Etna erupts, so when the eruption is a major one and the volcano spews a lot of ashes in the sky, the Catania airport may halt flights from and to CTA for safety. It doesn’t happen every day, but a few days a year it may happen.

Thanks to all for the tremendous suggestions. It's our first trip to Sicily so I'm sure we'll have more questions. And good to know about the train to the airport, as we plan on staying in Palermo for a few days then going to the airport to rent a car.

What we did was go into Catania and take a bus to Taormina. We trained to Siracusa and rented a car upon leaving. We returned the car at Palermo Airport and took the train into Palermo.

Used Avis and did not pay a drop off fee. We thought Taormina would be easy place to recover from jet lag while Palermo might have been more challenging. But may not be important to you if you staying a couple nights in Munich first.

It worked out well for us.

Last year we flew into Catania via Munich, and spent time there before renting a car and staying a week in Marina di Ragusa. We then returned the car in Catania, went to Salina for a week, and then to a hotel near Siracusa with a shuttle to Ortigia.

Flew home from Catania on Lufthansa, stopping for 5 nights in Munich. I was so happy that we decided to stay in Munich, and it would have been great to stay there before Sicily, as well. One of the many things that surprised me about Munich was the wonderful food!!!

Catania has better connections and more choice (including direct flights to the US via Delta to JFK) Catania also makes sense from an Itinerary standpoint, no need to backtrack to Palermo, and the airport in Catania is easier to get to for an early morning flight as opposed to Palermo.

Just to let you know both Palermo and Catania have direct non stop flights to the US, albeit only in high season.

United has a non stop flight Palermo-Newark NJ (and viceversa) a.k.a. the “Soprano Express”
Delta has a non stop flight Catania-JFK (and viceversa) a.k.a. the “Cosa Nostra Express”.
Both occasionally have flight offers that you can’t refuse.

Very funny!!!