Gole Alcantara

The Alcantara gorges are located in the omonymous valley in Eastern Sicily.They are about 25 metres high and between 2 and 5 metres wide.Alcantara gorges  is not only gorge it is beautiful natural landscape and attraction for many visitors. Around 2400 BC this natural monument of balast rock was created by the eruption of the volcano Monte Moio. The entire valley of the Alcantara river was flowed by lava, right to the place where the first colony in Sicily was founded by Greeks. The Alcantara gorges are located in the omonymous valley in Eastern Sicily.They are about 25 metres high and between 2 and 5 metres wide.The most spectacular segment of Alcantara gorges is located in the vicinity of Motta Camastra, where the river bed is walkable for about 3 km. The structure of stone walls in this spot is really characteristic. The rock is composed by a special kind of basaltic lava - poor in silicon and rich in iron, magnesium and calcium - which cooled down very slowly in time, creating impressive prismatic and hexagonal juts nowhere else in the world to be seen.

How to reach Alcantara Gorge It is not difficult to find Alcantara Gorges following the main road inland from Taromina-Giardini Naxos turning then along the 185 highway to the place called Francavilla di Sicilia you  reach after 13 kilometres the Alcantara complex. The less intrepid traveller can reach the gorges with a lift, but the more adventurous can descend into the gorge on foot, where the river can be followed for about 150 meters through mysterious shadowy rocky bends along the walls of the rock-face