At the beginning of the Easter holidays, some of my Shell peers and I were fortunate enough to go to Sicily in southern Italy for a geography trip. We visited several different sites and landforms, including an ancient Greek theatre in Taormina, the island of Lipari in the Aeolian islands and the famous Alcantara gorge.
A definite highlight of the trip was climbing Mount Etna, which is a 3,400-metre-tall active volcano. We took a cable car to an altitude of 2,500m and then started climbing. Although we couldn’t climb to the actual cone of the volcano as that would have been too dangerous, our guide took us through several smaller craters, which was an amazing experience. There were a lot of geothermal gases coming out of vents and it was very interesting to walk through them and feel the heat. After having a picnic lunch with a breath-taking view, we descended and took a snowy route back to the cable car.
Another highlight was visiting the Alcantara gorge and paddling in the river water. Our guide explained that there had recently been a significant snow melt that had come down from the mountains and flowed through the gorge, so the water was absolutely freezing. I know lots of people had numb feet for the rest of the morning! It was an incredible trip, and everyone had so much fun. We are really grateful to the teachers who organised and staffed it.
by Flora Wilson
