Has anyone traveled by trains/buses in Sicily? I will be staying in Santa Stephano Quisquina and am looking to see Catania/ Messina/Ragusa. Any info?

I don't know the location of the town you mention, but can tell you that Catania is a MAJOR rail/sea/bus hub, with services to just about anywhere you need to go on the Island. To Messina, the train is faster from Catania. To Ragusa, there is excellent bus service from Catania. There is also excellent bus service from Catania to Taormina, Siracusa, Piazza Armerina, Agrigento and Palermo. There is also bus and train service from Siracusa to Ragusa.

I am tentatively looking at Sicily for about 5 or so days next summer. Would you say renting a car is the preferred method to get around or is it relatively easy to get around by bus/train. I know everyone's veiw of what is "easy" is different. For example I found taking the bus from Florence to Siena, trains to Pisa and Lucca, etc. very easy. On the other hand, to visit the smaller Tuscan towns that only have 1 or 2 buses or trains a day, that don't go to the old centers, etc. - that's too much trouble and a car would be better. Thanks for your opinion.

In 5 days, you won't have time for much other than the major cities and towns, where you can easily rely on trains and buses.

GAC-Santa Stephano Quisquina is in the Agrigento region. Driving just seems to take forever, (so many mountains) are the trains faster, what do you think?

Isabel: What's "preferred" is pretty subjective, but the train and bus system in Sicily is not as good as the mainland, particularly in comparison to Tuscany. It also depends on where in Sicily you intend to travel. As GAC pointed out, the eastern corridor of Siracusa, Catania, Taormina, Etna and Messina are pretty convenient to train and bus. The northern corridor of Messina, Cefalu' and Palermo are all on the train line. But the southern and western parts, as well as the interior towns are not on any train lines and the bus service is hit or miss. If you intend to see any of the archeological sites (Agrigento, Selinunte, Segesta) or any interior towns, I'd say a car is preferred. Driving (outside of Palermo) is not as bad as some people think. Driving at night can be a challenge. Many of the smaller roads are not well-lit and the signage is not great. But if you take it easy, driving is not a problem.

The province of Agrigento generally has very spotty bus, and very little train, service. I have no idea what kind of public transportation, if any, serves this town you've mentioned. I can tell you that there is pretty good service out of Agrigento itself (train to Palermo; bus to Catania, Palermo, Licata, Gela, Sciacca, Castelvetrano, Mazara del Vallo, Marsala, Trapani). It's possible that you may need or want a car just to get to your town.

GAC- luckily i will be staying with family and they have a car but i didn't want to inconvenience them with a possible over night trip to the coast. One more question-any idea how long the drive is from agrigento to ragusa or catania? then catania to messina?
thanks for your help

Agrigento to Catania is between 2 hrs. 15 mins. and 2 hrs. 50 mins. hours by bus (SAIS Trasporti) The fastest bus leaves Agrigento at 8:30 and arrives Catania at 10:45. Fare is Euro 10 one way.
www.saistrasporti.it

Catania to Messina is 1.5 hours by train (Trenitalia). Fares depend on train type.
www.trenitalia.com

Agrigento to Ragusa is 3.0 hours by combination bus (to Gela) and train, as follows:

Agrigento lv. 15:30
Gela ar. 17:10
Gela lv. 17:18
Ragusa ar. 18:29

The bus drops you at the Gela train station, so the connection is easy. There is also an early morning (7:40) bus out of Agrigento, but this requires a 3.5 hours layover in Gela (from 9:20 to 12:55). During the layover in Gela, one could visit the important archeological museum.
www.autolineesal.it (bus)
www.trenitalia.com (trains)

Note that the SAL bus and some of the SAIS Trasporti buses don't operate on Sundays.

There are half-a-dozen or more Web sites, in English and Italian, about Santo Stefano Quisquina. Here is an English one:

http://sicilia.indettaglio.it/eng/co...quisquina.html

One of the Italian Web sites says that Santo Stefano Quisquina is roughly half-way along an imaginary line drawn from Palermo to Agrigento; i.e., it is inland and west of the imaginary line that joins Messina, Catania and -- with a slight detour -- Ragusa.