Travel Sicily Without a Car: Itineraries & Tips
Sicily is such a beautiful, lively, and distinct part of Italy. I love and agree with the famous quote from Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: “To have seen Italy without seeing Sicily is to have not seen Italy at all.”
So, you shouldn’t miss out on visiting this gem of an island just because you can’t or don’t want to rent a car and drive. Don’t let others tell you that a car is necessary - it’s not.
I lived in Sicily for a couple of years without a car and relied on public transportation to get to many places on the island. If you’re patient and have a sense of adventure, navigating Sicily without a car is very doable and fun.
In this post, I’ll share the various ways to get around Sicily without a car and 10 tips for a smooth, carless trip on the island. I’ve also created five “no car” itineraries, ranging from 7 to 14 days, that include destinations easily reachable by public transportation in Sicily.
Villa Bellini, Catania
Why Travel Sicily Without a Car?
Even though driving gets you anywhere you’d like, there’s also some stress and frustration that comes with driving in Sicily.
Pros of travelling without a car in Sicily:
Avoid stressful driving situations and narrow roads
No parking hassles and tickets (especially in historic centers)
Avoid frustrating mix-ups with car rental companies that are all too common in Italy
More walking and feeling active on vacation
Potentially save money, especially if you’re travelling solo or as a couple
Opportunity to sit back and relax, rather than navigating traffic and directions
Isola Bella, Taormina
How to Get Around Sicily Without a Car
Trains
Train travel is the simplest, most reliable form of public transportation in Sicily. The trains are comfortable, air-conditioned, have decent bathrooms, and don’t typically have any luggage limits. You can even bring a bicycle on the train, in case you want to rent one while in Sicily.
You can buy train tickets in advance on Trenitalia or Trainline. Personally, I love and always use the Trainline app. It’s the easiest to use for purchasing tickets, viewing all available time options, storing your e-tickets, and comparing train and bus schedules.
Trains in Sicily do have limitations. Depending on your starting point and the time of day, you cannot easily reach any destination by train. It’s always wise to compare train and bus schedules to choose the best option for each destination.
Buses
Travelling by bus is the cheapest way to travel in Sicily, and sometimes the fastest. Buses can often take more direct routes and make fewer stops than trains.
You can search bus schedules in Sicily and purchase tickets with Interbus, Etna Trasporti, and AST. Again, my favourite resource for viewing and booking bus tickets is the Trainline app. It’s much easier to navigate than the Italian websites. Just tap on “Coach” after the search results appear on the app.
The downside to travelling by bus in Sicily can be the bathroom situation, cleanliness, and reliability. In my experience, buses that travel between cities and towns are reliable. It’s the city buses that travel within Palermo and Catania that can be very erratic.
For travelling between cities and towns, don’t shy away from using the buses. They are a great option.
Ferries
Some of the itineraries I’ve created for this post include the Aeolian Islands (to the north) or the Egadi Islands (to the west). Both sets of islands are incredible destinations. To reach them, you would need to use the ferry.
You can book ferry tickets through Liberty Lines. Their website is sometimes difficult to navigate, so I prefer to book their services through Ferryhopper or Direct Ferries.
As for using the ferry to reach Sicily from another part of Italy, I don’t recommend it. There are many more practical and affordable ways to arrive on the island.
Guided Day Tours
Guided tours can be a great way to reach rural or hard-to-access areas you might want to visit in Sicily. Without a car, a tour may be the only way you can reach some destinations.
This includes Mount Etna, Sicily’s active volcano. If you’d like to hike it, there are many tours that you could join from Catania or Taormina.
Guided tours are also useful if you’d like to visit some wineries in the countryside.
Get Your Guide offers a wide selection of tours in Sicily.
Mount Etna
Taxis
You can easily find taxis in all of Sicily’s major cities, and particularly at airports. They can be a convenient option when you’re travelling in a group of 3 or 4 people from the airport to the city center or vice versa.
itTaxi is a popular app in Italy to book taxis. It works for finding taxis in and around Catania and Palermo, but don’t rely on it in other locations on the island.
Taxis are certainly much more expensive than using the train or bus in Sicily. The drivers also tend to overcharge tourists.
I don’t have much experience with using taxis in Sicily. While living in Catania, the 4 or 5 times that I used a taxi to get to or from the airport were stressful and expensive. But others may feel more comfortable with it and have better experiences.
Walking
There’s no way around it. If you want to travel in Sicily without a car, you will be walking A LOT. Not a scary, exhausting amount of walking, but a healthy amount.
Going to and from train stations, grocery stores, restaurants, sights, and beaches will certainly put you over the magical “10,000 steps per day”.
If money is no issue, then I suppose you can find ways around walking. But walking is undeniably easy on the budget and earns you some well-deserved gelato and pasta.
But let me get serious for a minute. If you’re limited in the amount of walking you can do, plan accordingly. You can still visit Sicily without a car. But pare down your itinerary to just a few destinations and soak up the slower pace of life. I don’t want you resenting Sicily because you tried to do more than what’s reasonable for you.
Cefalù
Note: I had wanted to include a “Whole Island” itinerary in this post, but decided against it. It was a struggle to put together a realistic, practical itinerary that included many destinations in the east and the west of Sicily. Without a car, circling the entire island requires more than 2 weeks.
So if you have 3 or 4 weeks to travel in Sicily, without a car, you could plan to travel the whole island. Make sure to include Agrigento and its Valley of the Temples in your itinerary, a location that’s not practical to include in a shorter trip, but is beautiful and fascinating!
The Valley of the Temples, Agrigento
Also Read: 10 Insider Tips to Visiting Catania
Sicily Itineraries Without a Car
Eastern Sicily Itineraries
7-Day Itinerary:
Day 1-2: Taormina
Spend a little time in Catania on your way to Siracusa
Day 3-7: Siracusa
Explore the island of Ortigia on foot
Take day trips to Avola, Noto, Scicli or Modica
10-Day Itinerary:
Day 1-2: Taormina
Day 3-4: Catania
Day 5-7: Siracusa
Explore the island of Ortigia on foot
Take day trips to Avola and Noto
Day 8: Scicli
Day 9-10: Modica
Take a day trip to Ragusa
Best Options to Travel Between These Destinations
Catania Airport - Taormina: Bus (€7, 1h20m)
Taormina - Catania: Train (€5.50, 45m-1h10m) or Bus (€5.10, 1h5m)
Catania - Siracusa: Train (€8.80, 1h15m-1h30m) or Bus (€6.20, 1h20m)
Siracusa - Avola: Train (€3.90, 24m)
Siracusa - Noto: Train (€4.80, 32m)
Siracusa - Scicli: Train (8.80, 1h24m-1h39m)
Siracusa - Modica: Train (€9.70, 1h37m-1h52m)
Siracusa - Scicli: Train (€8.80, 1h24m-1h39m)
Sclicli - Modica: Train (€2.20, 12m)
Modica - Ragusa: Train (€2.40, 20m-29m) or Bus (€2.70, 25m)
Modica - Catania Airport: Bus (€9, 2h20m)
Modica
Western Sicily Itineraries
7-Day Itinerary:
Day 1-2: Castellammare del Golfo
Day 3-5: Palermo
Optional day trips to Montreale or Mondello by city bus
Day 6-7: Cefalù
10-Day Itinerary:
Day 1-2: Palermo
Optional day trips to Mondello or Montreale by city bus
Day 3-4: Castellammare del Golfo
Day 5: Castelvetrano
Day 6: Marsala
Day 7-9: Favignana and/or Levanzo
Day 10: Trapani or Erice
Best Options to Travel Between These Destinations
Palermo Airport - Castellammare del Golfo: Train (€8.50, 50m-1h)
Castellammare del Golfo - Palermo: Train (€7.90, 1h43m-1h56m)
Palermo - Cefalù: Train (€7.10-€9, 45m-59m)
Cefalù - Palermo Airport: Train (€13.10, 1h56m-2h38m)
Palermo Airport - Palermo: Train (€6.80, 51m-1h9m)
Castellammare del Golfo - Castelvetrano: Train (€3.90, 45m-52m)
Castelvetrano - Marsala: Train (€3.90, 41m-1h)
Marsala - Trapani: (€3.40, 28m-45m)
Trapani - Favignana: Ferry (€23-€33 round-trip, 30m-40m)
Favignana - Levanzo: Ferry (€10-€16 round-trip, 10m)
Trapani - Erice: Cable car (€15 round-trip, 10m)
Trapani - Palermo Airport: Bus (€9.60, 1h10m)
Erice
Slow Travel Sicily Itinerary
14-Day Itinerary:
Day 1-4: Siracusa
Explore the island of Ortigia on foot
Take day trips to Avola, Noto, Scicli or Modica
Day 5-6: Taormina
Day 7-10: Aeolian Islands (Milazzo)
Island hop by ferry between Salina, Lipari, Vulcano, Stromboli and Panarea
Day 11-12: Cefalù
Day 13-14: Palermo
Best Options to Travel Between These Destinations
Catania Airport - Siracusa: Bus (€6.20, 1h10m)
Siracusa - Avola: Train (€3.90, 24m)
Siracusa - Noto: Train (€4.80, 32m)
Siracusa - Scicli: Train (€8.80, 1h24m-1h39m)
Siracusa - Modica: Train (€9.70, 1h37m-1h52m)
Siracusa - Taormina: Train (€11.50, 2h-2h40m)
Taormina - Milazzo: Train (€8.80-€14, 1h15m-2h20m)
Milazzo - Lipari (Aeolian Islands): Ferry (€35-€51 round-trip, 50m-1h10m)
Milazzo - Cefalù: Train (€11.10, 1h39m-1h47m)
Cefalù - Palermo: Train (€7.10, 45m-1h17m)
Aeolian Island of Salina
10 Tips for a Smooth Car-Free Trip in Sicily
Download useful apps
Trenitalia, Rome2Rio, Moovit, and Trainline are all useful apps to have when travelling in Italy without a car. Make sure to purchase an eSIM with lots of data, as you’ll be using your phone a lot.
Also, if you don’t already use it, download WhatsApp and create an account. Accommodation hosts and restaurants in Italy often use WhatsApp to contact you about your reservations.
Remember to validate your train and bus tickets
After purchasing train or bus tickets in Italy, you need to “validate” them, or have them stamped with the date/time.
For train tickets, you validate them at small machines before you get on the train. These little machines are often found next to the ticket machines or on the outer walls of the train station at Platform 1.
You can skip this ticket validation step by purchasing train tickets on your phone.
For bus tickets, you validate when you get on the bus. You’ll often find the validation machines in the middle or back of the bus. You only need to validate bus tickets on city buses, not coach buses.
Try to get taxi drivers to give you a price before you get into the taxi
Sometimes, taxi drivers in Sicily like to see if they can get away with charging much higher prices to tourists. If you can negotiate a price before you get in the taxi, you might save yourself some money.
Get familiar with the tabbachi
When in doubt about where to purchase bus tickets in smaller towns or for city buses, go to a tabacchi or tabaccheria. These little shops, found in every town, usually sell local bus tickets.
Check for Italian holidays and transportation strikes
Italian holidays or scheduled transportation strikes could interfere with your plans to travel by train or bus. Do a quick online search to see if your travel dates coincide with any Italian national holidays. And ask workers at the train or bus station if there are any upcoming strikes.
Use the bus to travel between Palermo and Catania
If you need to travel directly between Palermo and Catania during your trip, the bus is the fastest and most practical option. Bonus: You’ll get to see the incredible interior countryside of Sicily.
Look up the location of a town’s train station before planning to visit
This isn’t often the case, but sometimes a town’s train station is quite far from the town. For example, you can take the train to Enna, a large hilltop town in Sicily’s interior, but the town center is a 1-hour, uphill walk from the train station.
Note: All the destinations I have suggested to reach by train in this post are within walking distance of the town centers, except Milazzo. If you arrive in Milazzo by train, you will need to catch a bus or take a taxi to the town center.
Don’t book accommodations near the Catania train station
Booking accommodations near transport hubs (train stations or bus terminals) can be a practical idea, but don’t stay very close to the Catania train station. There are many nicer and safer areas of the city to stay in.
There’s no need to purchase train and bus tickets well in advance
Train and bus tickets don’t tend to sell out for travel on the island, so don’t purchase them too far in advance and leave yourself some flexibility. If you’re eager to book ahead of time, just do it 1 day in advance.
Be patient and easy-going
Sicily can be wild and unpredictable, but don’t worry… you’ll get where you need to be. Even if you encounter some delays or confusion with the public transportation, remember that it’s all part of the Sicilian experience.
It helps to go into the trip with the mindset that not everything will go exactly as planned. Gelato helps too.
Rest assured: Visiting Sicily is definitely doable without a car! And it comes with its benefits. So plan away!
If you have any questions about travelling in Sicily without a car that weren’t answered in this post, leave them in the comments below. Or better yet, contact me personally.
