Skiing Mount Etna: Hit the slopes one day, sail the next

1135AM GMT twelve March 2010

Previous of Images Next If the continue is good, you can mount at�a crater"s edge, smell the sulphur and suffer stimulating views of the Ionian, Adriatic and Mediterranean seas. Photo Alamy The main ski locus was lonesome in uninformed sleet that hid the evil black lava Photo Alamy

Did you know that with an experienced guide you can ski or snowshoe to the limit of Europe"s largest active volcano in winter? Once at the tip of Mount Etna, if the continue is good, you can mount at a crater"s edge, smell the sulphur and suffer stimulating views of the Ionian, Adriatic and Mediterranean seas.

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If you wish some-more of a challenge, you can begin from the volcano"s southern slant with sealskins strapped to your skis, span Etna"s limit of 3,329 metres and afterwards ski all the approach down by the birch and beech landscape of the northern flank. The treeless top slopes of the volcano are undiluted for wild off-piste snowboarding and the lava bumps and high-altitude winds have sleet white Etna a great place for the perfectionist competition of kite skiing.

All great chin-strutting, adrenalin-pumping stuff, but Etna frequency sounds similar to the majority viewable place to take my 10-year-old son for his initial ski lesson. Or does it? Further down the volcano, at about 1,800 metres, the lava spreads out similar to demerara sugarine to form kindly undulating slopes that have easy blue runs for ski softies similar to myself and my uninformed son.

These conditions and the actuality that the relations regard of the seashore of Catania and the delights of Taormina are usually a 40-minute expostulate away, have Etna a flattering great gamble for beginners.

I had experienced a pang of regard when I had beheld on the Ski Etna website that to one side the common sleet inform and webcams there was a territory entitled "Volcanic Activity" charity updates of any uninformed seismic shifts or new eruptions. Apparently the last important wake up was as new as Dec so I was personally relieved when we stepped out of the car at the Etna"s northern ski review of Piano Provenzana to find a tranquil, fireball-free landscape. The main ski locus was lonesome in uninformed sleet that hid the evil black lava and the southern Italian fever gave the total stage a soft glow. It was tough to design the extinction of usually eight years ago when a new five-mile crevasse had non-stop and lava had swept by the resort, destroying majority of the infrastructure. My guide, Claudio, forked to a large petrify footprint at the centre of the review where the Betulle Hotel had once stood.

"That used to be the main heart of the skiing movement and the most appropriate place for a drink after a mass departure up to the crater"s edge," he explained. Now the usually justification of the tear were a couple of resounding white larches on the corner of the piste. Everything else, from the sinecure apparatus and the wooden use huts to the hi-tech ski lift, was new. It might have taken a prolonged time, but the place was right away reborn as an eco-friendly, boutique resort.

My son, Ben, was unknowingly of the resort"s thespian story as he struggled with the humerous entertainment of his initial ski lesson. Using physique denunciation and gestures, Nino, his physical education instructor from the internal Italian ski school, communicated the scold viewpoint and the significance of the snowplough technique. After an hour or so of carrying his skis behind up the slant Ben communicated his depletion and the significance of a draglift there wasn"t one. I betrothed that after lunch the doctrine would turn a lot simpler when we could head up on the four-seater chairlift and rehearse the stops and turns as we changed down the peaceful slip of the half-mile Monte Conca run.

No such luck. After a typically drawn out Italian feast, together with a little glorious hand-rolled macaroni with wild mushrooms, the continue outward incited nasty. Etna was demonstrating that it is a critical towering able of impassioned continue conditions as the review remade from a family-friendly sleet play ground in southern Italy to Ice Station Zebra. Claudio explained that the genuine ski risk on Etna was not avalanches or eruptions, but skiers lost in haze or whiteouts.

It was patently time to take worth of Etna"s great shun pretence and we headed down to the kinder climes of the coast. Stepping out of the car at Casa Scimone, the villa in Taormina, was rather similar to removing out of Doctor Who"s Tardis after a mark of space travel. Instead of wintry whiteouts, we were greeted with the scents and colours of a semi-tropical coastal garden. Enormous cacti were in flower, the mimosa in freshness as Ben began picking oranges from the small timber for an après ski considerate of creatively squeezed juice.

On the following morning, to get the most appropriate of eastern Sicily and usually to infer that it is probable to ski one day and cruise the next, we hired a small neat yacht and headed out from the newly determined Porto Etna to the Gulf of Catania. The blue-black H2O was usually comfortable sufficient to suffer a discerning English-style dip, nonetheless I did notice that the skipper, Diego, buttoned up his puffer coupler and winced as we went in for the second time. Towelled dry we sat out on deck, basking in the fever and stared up at the snow-crowned rise of Etna.

Studying the strong La Montagna it was right away tough to heed in between plumes of volcanic smoke, icy clouds and swirls of blown snow, but as Diego destined us towards a prime seafood grill it was comforting to know that the preference of sea or ski was regularly on the menu.

Etna basics

There are dual small ski resorts on Etna; the incomparable and some-more swarming Rifugio Sapienza on the southern slant has a gondola, a chairlift and 3 ski rises whilst the prettier Piano Provenzana on the northern slant is versed with usually dual rises and a chairlift. See www.etnasci.it for the ultimate report about continue conditions and volcanic activity. For all organized winter trips hit Sicilian Capers, that offers recommendation and bookings in English (0039 333 412 2480; siciliancapers.com). Sicily Charter suggest from one day to one week"s yacht sinecure (www.sicilycharter.com)

Accommodation

Casa Scimone Villa in Taormina is accessible by Ville in Italia (055 412058; villeinitalia.com ). There are 3 guesthouses 3 miles from Piano Provenzana in the Etna National Park.

Rifugio Ragabo (095 647841; www.ragabo.it) offers great worth and transfers from Catania airfield to the resorts. Linguaglossa is the nearest main centre to the northern slope.

The Shalai Resort (095 643128; shalai.it), housed in the former locale hall, offers sauna treatments and a restaurant.

Getting there

British Airways (0844 493 0787; ba.com) flies from Gatwick to Catania.