Driving up Mount Etna with the Porsche Travel Experience Sicily
From orange lava to jet black rock, the Italian island is a colourful inspiration
You’ll find inspiration for colour everywhere on a Porsche Travel Experience. In eastern Sicily the looming presence of Mount Etna, and the vivid lava that flows from it, dominates the landscape
When you head out on the road with the Porsche Travel Experience Sicily, you get to explore the whole range of what the Mediterranean’s largest island has to offer. And one particular road leads directly to the hottest place in Sicily. Quite literally. Mount Etna is not just a landmark on the island, it’s one of the most active volcanoes in the world – a place where lava flows day and night. Which brings us to Lava Orange, one of the most iconic of all Porsche colours. It was a Porsche staple in the 1960s and 1970s but has recently made a glowing comeback courtesy of Porsche Paint to Sample. Driving up Mount Etna on a Porsche Experience Sicily road tripCreation and destruction, end and beginning. Here, high above the hustle and bustle of Sicily’s second city, Catania, on the rugged slopes of Mount Etna, you get particularly close to the eternal cycle of things. After a drive towards the summit through a succession of hairpins and sweeping corners in your Porsche, it’s then a short trek by foot up to the volcano’s caldera. As we head to the seething heart of this giant, we pass over crunching, black volcanic rock and past solidified lava fields. Etna produces crops because its slopes are among the most fertile in all of Italy. What grows here is lush and flavourful. But Etna also destroys. Villages have been buried by lava, cable cars have been destroyed and its ash can travel far and wide. Inspiration for Porsche colours can be found anywhere. Head to Sicily and who wouldn’t be moved by the Porsche Paint To Sample colour, Lava Orange?Porsche Paint To Sample’s Lava Orange – formed from volcanic inspirationThe people in the region are influenced by this proximity to peril – it’s in their DNA. It also has an impact on the participants of the Porsche Travel Experience Sicily. You rarely get closer to the primal forces of nature than when circumnavigating a volcano. The barren landscape is dominated by twisted rock formations, turning it into an enchanted lunar landscape, lifeless and yet fascinating. By contrast, the bubbling, orange lava represents the pure, untamed life force of the earth. A trip to Sicily with the Porsche Travel Experience sees the island’s colours put on a show – from vivid blue sea to orange lava glow to the black of its volcanic soilAlong with our fellow Porsche Travel Experience participants, we drive on – but we never fully leave the volcano. Etna, guardian of Sicily and one of the highest fire mountains in the world, can be seen from near and far. When locals look out of their window each morning, it reminds them who’s in charge here. In Greek mythology, the monster Typhon was buried under this mountain by Zeus, the father of the gods. The forges of the fire god Hephaestus are also said to have been located here. Today, as well as must-see destination for anyone travelling to Sicily, Etna is also known for being one of the locations for the Star Wars film, Revenge Of The Sith. Visit and you will understand why – there is no faster way to ‘visit’ an alien planet.Built in the mid-19th Century from black volcanic rock, Castello Solicchiata lies at the south western foot of Mount EtnaThe joy of driving on mountain roads on the Porsche Travel ExperienceEtna’s black volcanic rock is a constant throughout our Porsche Travel Experience trip to Sicily. Large chunks lying here, strangely shaped columns there, even as fine volcanic sand on beaches. The volcano looms over Castello Solicchiata. A legendary place some 30km by road from Mount Etna, to get here you have to drive down single-lane tarmac tracks. The castle’s walls, naturally, are made of volcanic rock. In Sicily, lava dominates.After a leisurely drive around the lower southern slopes of Etna in which you pass through sprawling Catania, arriving at the hilltop town of Taormina feels like you are returning from another world. Inevitably, Mount Etna towers proudly and silently above this pretty town, with its ancient Greco-Roman theatre and sandy beaches. The mighty volcano serves as a reminder to those of us on this Porsche Travel Experience trip, here in this land shaped by orange lava, to always enjoy the moment.Go with the flow: the Porsche Experience Sicily provides a mountain of colourful inspirationThe Porsche Colourful Experience: Paint To Sample inspirationLava Orange, Malaga Red, Glacier White, Casablanca Beige. What thoughts do these Porsche Paint To Sample colours conjure up for you? A road trip, freedom, adventure? If you’re unsure of what colour your Porsche would be, then let a journey with the Porsche Travel Experience inspire you to a unique Colourful Experience.
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