Favignana is the main island of the Egadi group that lies
just off the west coast of Sicily. Its symbol is a butterfly, as that is
supposed to be the island’s shape (it’s more like a ragged bat). The narrow
middle section is only about a kilometre across – we are anchored in a lovely
bay on the south side next to Punto Longo, and the main harbour is across on the north. The east
wing is flat, while the west wing rises in a 300+ metre limestone mountain,
topped by an Aragonese fort. It’s so
steep and high that it creates its own mini weather system and the fort is
often shrouded eerily in cloud.
We spent most of our first day recovering from the overnight
passage from Licata – it’s lovely to be rocked to sleep by the swell again. I
had my first swim of the season, hopping in to check the anchor, then hopping
out of the FREEZING water again as quickly as possible. After that a flotilla
of pinkish-brown stinging jellies came along so I had a good excuse to stay
out! The bay filled up with trip boats and charters during the
day, but only two other yachts remained overnight.
Isola Levanzo in the background
Next morning we were delighted to see Sarah Grace arriving and Anne and Gordon welcomed us aboard for a
cuppa. Then we all tootled off in our dinghy to the shore and set out to
explore Favignana and to find its three geocaches (none, thankfully, were up on
the mountain). We covered about 12 kilometres and discovered some beautiful
bays along the way, interspersed with hundreds of disused quarries. Along with
tuna fishing, cutting limestone (tufa) blocks must have sustained many island
families in the past. The old quarries have weathered into picturesque columns
and chasms, overgrown with caper bushes in flower. Some have even been
converted into beautiful productive gardens, with olive and pomegranate trees,
grape vines and citrus. Terry and Gordon located all three geocaches, and we
arrived back at the boats only a little the worse for wear.
Geocachers
Quarry garden
Next day was pretty much a rest and repair day, with only
one near disaster when I tried to pump up the dinghy and managed to pump most
of the air out of it. While I was
sitting in it on the water. For a reasonably smart person, I’m sometimes amazed
by what a dickhead I can be. Anyway, we managed the 50 metres over to Sarah
Grace in our very squashy craft, and enjoyed watching Sunshine on Leith with Anne and Gordon, a cultural exchange for
introducing them to The Castle last
week. They left for Sardinia early next morning. It was a real treat to spend
some time with our friends from Finike – they are great company, very
experienced cruisers and have a wealth of knowledge about history, the natural
world, books and much else - I hope we’ll meet up again along the way.
We decided on an extra day or two here to see the town and get a
few supplies. Just around the point we discovered a little harbour full of cute
fishing boats and the day was perfect for a stroll across the waist of the
island to Favignana town. Plenty of quite up-market small villas suggest a
thriving tourist industry. From the people strolling the town centre and
enjoying the many restaurants, the tourists appeared to be mainly good-looking
young Italians. Cycling seems to be the preferred mode of transport on this
relaxed island and every villa has a fleet of bicycles, which transport the
beautiful people to their choice of bars and beaches. Even so, it isn’t
expensive – for 45 euro we enjoyed a meal for two of fresh local tuna steaks,
tomato salad, chips, bread, wine and coffee – totally delicious.
Fishing boat harbour
Today we took another short trip into town and now we’re
planning the next run – just a short passage over to Trapani to see the sights
and hopefully take a cable car up to the old mountain town of Erice.
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