Sicily – the mysterious Necropoli di Pantalica

What do parents do with a 7-month-old baby in Sicily? No, they don’t beach. They spend their time actively, on the move. We found a place, ideal for light trekking, and very interesting – Necropoli di Pantalica.

Necropoli di Pantalica is located near Syracuse, about an hour’s drive away. Nevertheless, it is not enough to enter the name of the place in the GPS – we recommend that you study the map well and point to a specific point on the map, because this place can be reached from two sides, and depending on which side you arrive, from that side you view the graves….. Yes, because Necropoli di Pantalica are nothing more than…. graves, but about them in a moment ;)

Getting to Necropoli di Pantalica

The access road itself is also interesting – you enter a plateau and the road continues through several small villages. There’s not much to count on for signs, sometimes there are and sometimes there aren’t, so it’s good to have a map or navigation.

Once past Sortino, the road narrows to simply end at some point! Why signs that dead end, no? It’s good that it ends where we wanted to get to, but if we had wandered off and looked for another place, we would have had a big chunk to make up.

Hinting to you, it is best to head for the town of Sortino. There, if you are lucky, you will already find small blue signs directing sometimes to “Necropoli di Pantalica”, sometimes to “Necropoli” and sometimes to “Pantalica”, seriously :) All in all, you should end up on the road “Via Pantalica” (marked as SR11 on the map).

On the map below you can see exactly where you should go and our suggested route to get there.

Of course, you can reach Sortino itself from different directions, but our proposed route takes an interesting route with cool views as you ascend the plateau.

Tour of the Necropoli di Pantalica

Entrance to the Necropolis is free, but there is, of course, a person sitting in a wooden booth with an obvious faint knowledge of English. Fortunately, we were able to communicate with the help of flashes and drawings (we’ll spare you this: cars are left at the side of the road before entering, and the route leads to a river that cannot be crossed and you have to be very careful, as it can be slippery).

The other information we obtained (how many to the nearest tombs) turned out to be false, as the first signs we encountered along the way proved.

So we took Olive in a sling and went for a walk through the valley where the two rivers Calcinara and Anapo join. Although the riverbed itself is very pretty and spectacular, something that attracts tourists and school tours here are the tombs carved into the rocks. Not just any old ones – they date from the 8th to 13th centuries. BC!!! In addition, there are more than 5,000 of them located here!!!

The numbers are impressive. You can see that it is also an educational place, unfortunately, in English it is difficult to learn something in detail.

Walking along the designated trail, we were more gazed at the riverbed and the tombs on the other side than those right next to us. These are square holes in the rocks, behind which are smaller or larger caves. Currently they are more or less neglected, overgrown – there is nothing to go in for :)

On the panorama it looks like this:

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More impressive are those on the vertical rock on the other side, one next to the other. There are also larger grottos and caves to delve into as well.

The whole route is easy, although it can be slippery and sometimes you have to jump over rocks, but even with a baby in a sling it was manageable and safe.

We hit good weather here it was reasonably warm, but in summer it is probably very hot here, so we recommend taking light, airy clothes and something protective from the sun. Of course, there are no stores along the route :)

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It is an interesting place, easily accessible, ideal for light trekking, even with a child. A nice break from ancient temples, theaters and baroque cities :) Highly recommended!

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See also our summary of Sicily vacations and all posts about Sicily.