Page 290 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

there’s also the Linea beach bus, departing from Piazza San Pancrazio (7daily; €1).

A little further north from Mazzarò are the beach bars and restaurants at SPISONE,
which you can either walk to from Mazzarò (10min) or directly down from Taormina

(around 30min); take the path from below the cemetery, off Via Guardiola Vecchia.

Giardini-Naxos

The best sand beaches close to Taormina are those at GIARDINI-NAXOS, south of
town, where a long strip of sand curves around the wide bay, backed by a busy
promenade of bars, cafés, restaurants and hotels. It’s much more of a resort in the

Italian style than Taormina – packed and noisy until late September each year, and
then largely drawing up the shutters until the following spring. Half of the beach is free
(“spiaggia libera”), although the better sands further around the bay towards the cape
are partitioned off as private lidos, complete with sun-loungers, shades, watersports
gear, bars and restaurants.

Greek colony excavations

Daily 9am until 1hr before sunset • €3

Significantly, Giardini-Naxos bay was the site of the first Greek colony in Sicily. As
an obvious stop for ships sailing between Greece and southern Italy, there was a
settlement here by 734 BC, named Naxos after the Greek island from which the

colonists came, though it was never very important. The excavations on the site of the
ancient settlement lie right on the cape, Capo Schisò, with the entrance right by La
Sirena restaurant, overlooking the harbour. The remains are disappointingly sketchy,
though they stretch across a large area of the cape and it’s pleasant to stroll through the
olive and lemon groves around the site. There’s scarcely any interpretation of what
you’re seeing – scant foundations of a large, gridded town and a long stretch of

ancient, lava-built city wall – and the small museum on site that houses some of the
finds doesn’t really help either.

< Back to Messina, Taormina and the northeast

The Alcantara valley

Around 2400 BC, an eruption of the Monte Moia volcano, at the head of the Alcantara
valley, smothered the river and filled the valley with lava. Over four millennia, the
Alcantara river has carved its way through the deposits of slick grey basalt, forming

the magnificent gorge, the Gola di Alcantara, and scooping the rock into all manner of
strange, sculptural formations. It is a lovely drive from Taormina, some 20km to the
east, through gentle hills covered with citrus groves, olive trees and wild flowers, and
there are a couple of beguiling towns to visit, namely Francavilla and, more notably,