kettamic

My wife and I will be spending two weeks driving around Sicily in September. The plan right now is to fly into Palermo and pick up a rental car. Three questions: 1. to avoid driving into Palermo is there a town close by that would be a nice place to stay and take a train into Palermo as a day trip? 2. Is there a hotel near the Palermo airport for our last night and our early morning return flight?
3. As an option, would Catania be a better airport to fly in and out of?
We will be winging it, as we always do in Italy and Europe, and can use either location as a start and finish.

vincenzod

Depending on your needs and your desires, Catania is better than Palermo as airport solution.
But, if possible, the traffic of Catania is even worst than the traffic of Palermo so that, I suggest you to stay in Acireale and from this wonderful area make your day trips including, by train, Catania.
From the Catania airport to Acireale, by car, the time is more or less half hour.
September is a very delicious month, especially if in its second half: the hot period finished and it is very lovely warm.
My suggestion to sleep is the very charming and elegant B&B PALAZZO PENNISI DI FLORISTELLA (www.palazzopennisidifloristella.com) If available ask and reserve "il mezzanino", very romantic and with a beautiful view.
Have a lovely trip, ciao.



Vincenzo

thursdaysd

But why not stay in Palermo itself? There is good, cheap public transport including both a bus and a train from the airport, and a bus to Monreale. Then you can go back to the airport to pick up your rental car. Can you fly into Palermo and out of Catania, or vice versa, to save backtracking?

kettamic

thursdaysd:

That is something we are considering.
I thought after the long overnight flight it might be easier just to hop in the car and go to a smaller town
and do a day trip into Palermo after we are rested....then, if we wanted to see more of Palermo, we could do it on the end.

zeppole

Driving in Sicily is a challenge everywhere, so if you feel you can't handle street traffic in Palermo after a long overnight flight, you're going to have a problem with road traffic in Sicilia.

Is there an overnight flight to Catania?

Anyway, there are trains and buses that go to towns other than Palermo from the Palermo airport. You can check out the options here:

http://www.aeroporto.palermo.it/inde...92&lang=en

I suspect the Catania airport has a similar website.

thursdaysd

kettamic - each to her own, but driving after an overnight flight isn't something I've ever enjoyed - but I get very little sleep in economy class! If you took the bus or train into the train station in Palermo I'm sure you could get a taxi from there if you didn't want to take a city bus. But you could consider Mondello, which is close, or Cefalu, which would be more interesting, but is a bit further, or Trapani, which I enjoyed much more than I expected, and could be a base for visiting gorgeous Erice.