Etna Wineries Tour + Silvestri Craters Discovering

Etna Wineries Tour + Silvestri Craters Discovering - Excursions from Port

Vines have been cultivated on Mount Etna since the beginning of the Bronze age, say 4 or 5 millennia ago. Despite the difficulties due to the volcano eruptions and the fine sands in the soils that damage the vines, the wines produced today on the slopes of Mount Etna are of excellent quality and were the first to qualify for the DOC designation in 1968. They include rosados (rosé’s) and dry white and red wines. They are made mainly from Caricante, Catarratto, and Nerello Mascalese, a deep-colored black grape with spicy notes mostly grown in eastern Sicily. We drive first to Santa Venerina to visit the cellars and wine tasting. The historic estate of Murgo, situated in privileged position southeast of Mount Etna, has been making wines traditional to this territory since 1850. The volcanic soil gives the wines a particular mineral taste typical of Mount Etna, as well as unusual finesse, aromatic complexity, and strong personality. We proceed the tour to Zafferana Etnea, a beautiful little town several times involved in the eruptions of Mount Etna, and we’ll have a wine/food tasting of some delicious Sicilian products there. We continue the tour reaching the altitude of 6.000 fits (2.000 ms); we will have another tasting of some Sicilian wines, particularly dessert wine, in a panoramic open space faced on the lava belonging to the more recent eruptions. Then, before we take you back to your final destination, we offer a quick city tour of Messina.