Sunday, June 21, 2015

Sicily Travel: A20 Highway to hell and back

We'd been here months, and living life contentedly when I realized it was almost time to leave this beautiful, frustrating island. The Belgian couple Christopher met when his Brussels air flight was delayed highly recommended Piazza Armerina and the mosaics at the Villa Romana del Casale. They also recommended an agrotourism place near by - Bonnata. After discovering that dogs were ok, we made a reservation and got on the highway.

We never seem to be able to leave on time, so it was hours later that I'd intended before we got out our drive. Our handy satellite navigation system confirmed what the Michelin maps on line had told me, that it would take around 3 hours to get to our destination - about my tolerance level for a casual drive. I'd reviewed the Michelin map online before making the reservation and found nothing amiss. Imagine our surprise when we discovered that there was a diversion in place. We assumed it was a little bit of road work (very common to have only one lane of traffic instead of 2 on the Sicilian autostrada). That was far from the case. There had been a landslide in April 2015 which destroyed a large chunk of the autostrada in this mountainous part of the island resulting in a detour which took an extremely picturesque and winding route up to and through a lovely mountain town. Unfortunately there was no warning nor controls about what size vehicles could take this road. The photos don't do justice to the incredibly tight turns. All it would take is a semi with a camper coming the other way and you'd have a 4 day traffic jam.

Christopher was amazing and managed to shake off the few tight squeezes and precipitous drops. I was a bit more distraught - I am not a good passenger! The views were amazing, and I am certain that the tiny mountain town we all drove through is having the best tourism year in it's history.

It was at the end of this detour that the satellite navigation system stopped working. We think it became so frustrated with us ignoring its constant requests to "turn around when possible" that it is now in a permanent huff. Leaving us in the middle of Sicily with a Lonely Planet Sicily guide book and a rather poor Michelin road map book (where the spot we ended up was on 8 different pages).

No comments:

Post a Comment