Best Of Sicily Shore Excursion: Etna, Taormina, Castelmola - 10 Persons Max

While the sites and tour guide were nice, the management overbooked this tour and we left 40 minutes late. We got an email a few days before the excursion stating that there were going to be 14-16 people on the tour and if we weren’t happy, we could cancel. They advertise 10 people max! What were we going to do since we were already on the ship and had booked this well in advance? Then on the day of the excursion, 14 people were on the bus and the guide said 3 were missing (now it’s 17?, not great), but that if the people didn’t show up within 15 minutes of scheduled time we’d leave. 20 minutes past scheduled time she arrives with 2 new people who just joined. We were not happy as these people probably got a great deal last minute, less than what we paid through Viator. So we finally left with 16 people on board. Once we were out of the port the manager called our guide and told her the 3 missing people were now there waiting. He literally forced the guide and driver to go back to get them. With now a packed full mini-bus of 19 people, and bad traffic, we left the port 40 minutes late! Ugh! While we were at Castelmola we were only given 20 minutes, far less than needed to see the town. What a waste of a stop. Then at Taormina, the guide insisted on walking us all the way though town to show us the meeting place on the other side. A much more effective way then walking the entire group there and wasting what free time we had was to give us a map and point out key landmarks to find it. Once we finally got our free time we were at the end of the town and had to go back to begin. I would NOT recommend this tour. Very poor management and they did not stick to what was promised when we booked! Just horrible! We should get a partial refund for all the problems!

Our visit to Sicily on our cruise was made special by this small group tour. The guide, Sergio, was knowledgable, engaging, and fun to be with. The sites--Etna, Taormina, and Castelmola-- were breathtaking. We were partiularly enchanted by Castelmola, a small, beautiful town on the top of a rock.

We were 4 people and had booked an up to 10 persons trip - it was in reallity just the four of us. The negative was that it was 4 adults in a medium sized car, so the three in the back were a little cosy! The trip itself was excellent with Etna as the highlight. a really good way of seeing what we wanted to see.

We had a wonderful tour with our guide Serge. He was attentive and informative with lots of information about the local area. He basically ran the tour with his great itinerary, we didn’t have to ask for anything he hadn’t already thought of.

We loved going to Etna, but didn’t enjoy the long drive to the other places. Enjoyed our driver. Van was fine