Page 382 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

around 7km east of Modica (and very clearly, indeed almost obsessively, signposted).

From the entrance (where there’s a café), a landscaped path descends into the gorge,
where towering fronds of bamboo and wild fennel grow amid the fig, pomegranate and
walnut trees. There are catacombs immediately below the site entrance, while the
path meanders back through the site past tombs and dwellings cut into the cliff face.
The route through the gorge starts on the other side of the road from the entrance,
running under the road bridge.

Molino ad Acqua

Via Cava d’Ispica 89, Modica • Daily 9am–7pm • €3 • 0932 771048, cavallodispica.it

Heading to Cava d’Ispica Nord from either Modica or Ispica, you may like to make a
stop at the fascinating working watermill of Molino ad Acqua – just follow the many
signs. Here you can watch the mill – set on the horizontal, rather than the vertical, so
that it could still work when water levels were low – grinding wheat into flour, and
visit the cave-house (with bed, laundry and kitchen) where members of the family who
ran it lived until the 1950s.

< Back to Siracusa and the southeast

Modica

The small but busy town of MODICA, 17km northwest of Ispica and 18km south of
Ragusa, is enjoying a new lease of life as a select tourist destination, based again on
its remarkable late Baroque heritage. A powerful medieval base of the Chiaramonte
family, and later the Cabreras, it was once far more important than Ragusa itself,
though ironically, following the reconstruction after 1693 (which has earned it
UNESCO World Heritage status) it never regained its erstwhile prestige. There’s

really not much to see to Modica – a night would do it full justice – but it is an
enjoyable place to visit. There’s interest enough in simply strolling the Corso and
window-shopping in the boutiques, fancy shoe shops, enotecas and gourmet delis.

SICILY’S CHOCOLATE CITY

Mention Modica to most Italians and they’ll think chocolate. The great Sicilian
writer Leonardo Sciascia declared that “Modican chocolate is unparalleled …
tasting it is like reaching the archetype, the absolute … chocolate produced
elsewhere, even the most celebrated, is an adulteration, a corruption of the original.”
In fact, the chocolate sold here is unlike most other chocolate you’ll have

encountered, from its grainy, crunchy texture to the undertones of cinnamon, orange,
vanilla, honey, almonds and even salt and pepper. You can sample it in a myriad of
ways, from ice cream to Modica’s famous hot chocolate, but it’s most readily