I spent about 10 days in Erice (Sicily, Italy). It was a work thing – I was attending a conference there. I’d never heard about Erice before that, and that was definitely my loss, the place is magnificent!
The main thing is its situation – the town of Erice is located on top of Mount Erice, at around 750 metres (2,460 ft) above sea level, overlooking the city of Trapani. So, basically, you are in a small town on the top of a huge mountain, overlooking its surroundings! You are surrounded by magnificent views, see my pictures.
The weather is very changeable, hence, you constantly see the view changing 🙂 Just come to the same point every day (which is what I did during my daily morning runs) and see a different picture!
The town is absolutely lovely – those tiny narrow streets and old buildings 🙂 It is quite small as well, so, unless you’re attending a conference from morning till evening as I did, you don’t need 10 days.
There is a number of shops selling cute local stuff and souvenirs, a number of restaurants.
There are two castles that remain in the city: Pepoli Castle, which dates from Saracen times, and the Castello di Venere (“Venus Castle”), dating from the Norman period, built on top of the ancient Temple of Venus, where Venus Ericina was worshipped (thank you wiki).
I would say, however, that all of it can be covered in one day. On the other hand, there are many things you can see around on 1-day excursions (I’ll get back to it later).
One thing I want to mention first. It happens quite often that a cloud passes the mountain of Erice. When that happens, the town looks amazingly mysterious! Which is why it is nice to stay there for several days, waiting for it!
We had two tours organised by the conference and I enjoyed both a lot, just to give you an idea of what to do while staying there, besides visiting Trapani for a day on the beach 🙂
The first one was visiting Trapani Salt Flats. It’s a fascinating place where the salt is being made, it looks visually stunning. Another one – a visit to a historic Greek theatre and temple in Segesta.
So, it’s a wonderfull gem to visit! Or to have a conference 🙂
