Travel from Puglia to Taormina
 

I 'm was going to fly from Bari to Catana and just got a rude awaking regarding the time and cost. I have a car and was going to travel from Lecce to Bari (1 night) and then fly the next morning. 4 hours flying thru Rome is to long for me. I am driving from Matera to Lecce (2 nights) so I can just skip Lecce and drive direct to San Giovanni from Metera and catch the ferry but I don't know what there is of interest along the way or I can still go to Lecce and spend longer hours driving to San Giovanni. Any suggestions?

Consider driving from Matera to Napoli airport and flying to Catania from there. Meridiana, easyJet and Alitalia all fly non-stops from Napoli to Catania.

Drive 156 miles to catch a plane to fly 350 miles, to get somewhere that's only 296 miles from where you started? No wonder the ice caps are melting! ;0)

Just drive and take the ferry, or train it.

@ Man_in_seat_61 -- nailed it! :-)

Nailed it? Not really.:)

http://www.yaleclimateconnections.or...ng-vs-driving/

Not in any way disputing climate change, that the ice caps are melting due to human behavior or the need for people to manage their carbon footprint. But it is not so simplistic about whether this particular traveler would be doing the right thing or the wrong thing by flying rather than ground transportation for this trip in Italy.

(You need to read the whole article.)

if the OP concludes that driving + a ferry is better for the planet than flying, then driving from Matera to Salerno to take the ferry to Messina is better than driving from Matera to San Giovanni to take the ferry. Including Lecce by car would not be environmentally helpful.

Book a direct flight from Bari to Catania.
There are also direct buses, but it takes almost a whole day.

I think the problem may be that the OP is flying on a day when Volotea doesn't fly (they are the only airlines that flies that route non-stop, as far as I know, and they skip some days.

I'd like to add just one other thing about why "the ice caps are melting" and calculating one's carbon footprint as a traveler.

I hope everyone on Fodor's can agree that the main reason we reached a point of crisis regarding is people ignoring science.

I used to believe that ground travel is overwhelmingly more environmentally friendly than air travel. That belief was — in my case — very easy to sustain because I don’t own a car in Italy and taking the train here is often the easiest way to get around.

However, I have no choice but to fly several times a year to the US for relatives who do not live near major US airports. So I began to wonder: Is it better for the “ice caps” to rent a car at the airport and drive to where my relatives live, or is it better for the “ice caps” to get a connecting flight to a regional airport closer to them and have them pick me up?

Turns out the answer has been: Every trip gets a different answer because it depends on a lot of different variables, so you need to do the calculations anew if one of the variables changes. (Traveling alone? In busy season? On a busy air route? Which time of year? Time of day?) Sometimes it is more environmentally friendly to drive or use public transportation. Sometimes you are helping the planet more if you fly.

Planet is not going to be saved by people cheerleading for answers they think are “no brainers’ rather than looking at the most recent science, which is not static. The 2015 Yale study for which I provided a link is candid about its limitations and it is always a possibility that new information will emerge to change my mind and Yale’s studies yet again, and I’ll end up driving more than I do now. (And hey, it is "exhilarating" to drive around much of southern Italy.)

Can't really say for the OP, for this trip, which transportation would be the most protective of the ice caps. But I will say what makes the ice caps melt is asserting, contrary to the best science to date, that the answer is simple and obvious and the same whether you have all the details or not.

(and if you haven't read the Yale article, please do, and if you don't agree, take it up with Yale and the scientists, not me. I just won't argue this with anybody who will not use current science as the basis)