Page 43 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

eurostar.com

Rail Europe UK 0844 848 4078, US 1800 622 8600, Canada 1800 361 7245,
raileurope.co.uk

Italian Railways 892021, trenitalia.com

BUS CONTACTS

Eurolines UK 0871 781 8178, Textphone for UK customers who are deaf 0121
455 0086, eurolines.com.

SAIS 091 617 1141, saistrasporti.it

< Back to Basics

GETTING AROUND

You don’t have to rent a car to see Sicily’s major towns and sights, but getting

around by public transport is not always as easy as it should be. The rail system is
slow, few buses run on Sundays and route information can be frustratingly
difficult to extract, even from the bus and train stations themselves. On the
positive side, public transport prices are reasonable.

The “Arrival and departure” sections in this book give the full picture on transport

schedules and frequencies. Note that unless specified, these refer to regular working-
day schedules, ie Monday to Saturday; services are much reduced, or even
nonexistent, on Sundays. Note also that comments such as “every 30min” are
approximations – on the railways in particular, there are occasional gaps in the
schedule, typically occurring just after the morning rush hour, when the gap between
trains may be twice as long as normal.

One thing to bear in mind is that travelling by train is not the best way to see all of

the island. Some stations are located a fair distance from their towns – Enna and
Taormina are two notable examples (though there are bus connections) – while much
of the west and centre of Sicily is only accessible by bus or car.

SICILY’S SIX BEST DRIVES

SS120, Nicosia to Polizzi Generosa Bare landscape punctuated by isolated hilltop
villages, with Etna dominating the eastern horizon.

SS185, Tyrrhenian coast to Taormina Across the Peloritani mountains to Etna and
the sea.