Ferrovia Circumetnea: Why Sicily Built A Railway Up An Active Volcano đ
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- Äas pĆidĂĄn 22. 06. 2018
- The Ferrovia Circumetnea is a very quaint, 120-year-old narrow-gauge railway with an unusual selling point: it goes up an active volcano. The biggest active volcano in Europe, in fact - the mighty Mount Etna. I went to Sicily to find out more...
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I really like your videos. They are short, to the point and show interesting corners of Europe. Your narration is amusing and informative. I appreciate that you have the camera pointed at the surroundings and not at yourself as many You Tubers do. Keep up the great work.
"No one combines vintage rail transport and volcanoes quite like they do here"
A hotly contested niche, for sure!
What about the Circumvesuvia round the Bay of Naples and Mt Vesuvius?
Try Japan
The volcano would be hot, yes!
I rode this when I was exploring Sicily a few years ago. Got off randomly a few times to explore, found an abandoned convent or something in a town with warfare scars still on the buildings. Good times.
Just gonna hop on a 50 year old train to go pick pistachios on the side of a volcano because thatâs just normal everyday stuff, yaâknow.
It is there
The trains are 40 years old
And in 2 years new trains will arrive and will replace the old trains
Dude, I don't know why I started watching your channel, but I absolutely love it. Currently binge watching everything. I'm much more likely to search for the local historical railway in the next town I visit than before.
I watched this about two hours ago and now I've herd Etna has erupted again!
Yikes! I often wonder about this while watching TravelPorn. Lol hoping Tim or bald or Tom Scott or toycat or... dont wind up filming natural disaster.
I mean it...I was in SF in 89 for earthquake and it was sofa king scary
@@michaelhatling1453 sofa king scary?
@@worldscalephotography Say it out loud to your maiden aunt ;o)
Took me a while LOL
@@michaelhatling1453 Wait did you say...porn?
If you think building a railway on an active volcano is crazy, you have to know that on Etna there are also skiing resorts
Looks like a beautiful area!
The railway reminds me of the funicular railway that used to go up Mt Vesuvius (until it was destroyed in the 1944 eruption).
Great vid Tim. I went on a similar railway line around Mt Vesuvius, from Napoli to Pompeii and back
It's the similarly named "Circumvesuviana". Vesuvius IS active too, just not as active as Etna - last eruption during WWII.
I was riding that same railway when one crazy Italian decided to throw a massive rock through the window. (nobody got hurt)
Actually the Circumvesuviana goes beyond Pompeii to Sorrento, and has 4 other routes too
@@Minecraftrok999 Are you sure it wasn't the volcano erupting?
Catching up and rewatching your videos during lockdown times and I am greatly appreciating the kind, gentle, and funny way you present your videos. Thank you!
Cheers Eddus!
1:49 That was a very well-disguised transition and was perfectly timed with the narration. Great work!
Rode this last month, great ride especially in the old railcars with the open windows.
Beautiful views. What a nifty rail system.
Really like that it's still a normal commuter and industry railway.
yup. In the last decade, they have opened three underground variants in three small towns between Bronte and Catania.
I took the Funivia up Etna a few years ago and despite at least three minutes of research before planning my holiday,I didn't even know this existed.I'd like to go back to Sicily at some time as I only had a couple of days there,so will give this a ride on.
Omfg only now YT recommends me this video. My family is from Catania, right next to the station. My dad when he was a kid, used to hop on this train with his friends from Borgo to Cibali, just to watch the football matches
I'm proud to say, those new diesel units were built in Poland. You can actually see the manufacturer's logo ,,Newag" under the driver's cab.
âIt takes two hours to make the 70km journeyâ. Try the M25 Tim!
In Britain, we'd brand this fine service "HS2"
Sounds about the same average speed as my country's subway/rapid transit (~1 1/2h to cover ~50km)
The "Bronte" referred to is the centre of the Duchy of Bronte awarded to Lord Nelson in gratitude for his victory at Aboukir Bay.
I thought it was named after Bronte beach in Sydney :P
@@worldscalephotography Hardly, unless time travel has been perfected.
"Who is this Bront woman?" -- George V
Thank you for the video. I'm adding the trip to my bucket list!
Hi I really enjoyed your video on Ferrovia Circumetnea, it brought back good memeories of when I lived in Sicily in the mid1990s
I think youâd enjoy the Mount Washington cog railway. Not a volcano, but very interesting nonetheless.
Why do I get the feeling that you are a fellow New Hampshirite?
Yes it is. Iâm from CT and I love the cog railway
What a coincidence, I just watched Mustie1's video about that!
2:49 that's one beautiful scenery!
And there are so many of those in the rest of Italy as well. It's just such a beautiful country. Barely functional at times, but very, very beautiful indeed. And then the people: what are essentially traffic wardens have uniforms that in other countries would be reserved for special occasions, such as a royal visit. Even the street sweepers wear beautifully designed hi-viz uniforms.
I lived in Catania for a few years but never rode on the Ferrovia Circumetnea. We would just drive up to the Rifugio Sapienza to hike up Etna.
Thank you ! I really like your videos!
Thanks a lot for this Iâm actually in Catania now, and found this very helpful !
The circumvesuvius railway is also quite nice. Cheers Tim for another great video.
Stunning visuals of the village...
Looks like and amazing journery!
Well Tim I just finished binge watching a heap of your videos many of watching Iâve seen before. Absolutely love your work. Thanks for sharing and keep up your great work. Greetings from Straya đŠđșđŠđșđŠđșđđ»đđ»đđ»
before the 2000s the railway actually went INSIDE the city of Catania. This cabride [in Italian] from 1994 is a clear example of that. After 2000 the terminus has been moved to Catania Borgo
Edit: there are plans to convert the part until Randazzo in the new Catania Metro line.
Enjoying your videos. I wish you'd expand this one by an hour or two.
I love your videos. Interesting places and facts nobody cares about (except us).
Like you I also visit places on my journeys not many people would stop and ignore tourist places.
Man! We just took a silly bus up the mountain. (I suppose we probably got higher up the mountain on the bus than we would have on the train, but the train would have been more fun :) ).
you mean a S(ic)illy bus.
@@sirBrouwer If it was a Sicilian bus, it wouldn't have 2nd gear. That's nice and all that you took a bus *up* the mountain but have you skied *down* that mountain? :D
@@tehpw7574 how is skiing down a mountain a word pun?
Did the ride also. It is a long drive with beautiful views
Grazie a CZcams per avermi consigliato questo video molto bello e informativo đđđźđč
The mountains north of Etna are never mentioned in tourist guides, but, wow are they wonderful!
this is a epic youtube channel!
Funny how almost the EXACT same story exists in Naples for the Ferrovia Circumvesuviana, although throw in some other spur lines and graffiti in.
Thats quite a dangrous volcano... italians: " We ShOuLD BiUlD A RAIlWaY TheRe"
nah, etna is not dangerous. Vesuvio is. And we built there one of our largest city! napoli
"Sicilians"... Funny. I was stationed there for 2 years (long ago) but I did not know that the railway trekked -around- the mountain...
... The alternation of capital letters together with lowercase letters should simulate an Italian that pronounces the phrase in English with its striking accent, and therefore underline that Italians are imbeciles because they built a railway ... what to say? I'm baffled.
Not really dangerous: he's still active, he erupts tiny bits of lava but it's pretty safe.
The Vesuvio, on the other hand... He could explode at any time cuz he's quiescent
Idiot: in addition to not answering, you ignore or pretend to ignore the many vulvcanic islands on which humanity at any latitude and longitude has built buildings, roads, infrastructures, etc., such as Hawaii, where it was built exactly in meeting point between two faults, between eruptions and quite frequent destructive earthquakes .. oooh yes, but those are not Italian, and you certainly do not spend your time to put idiotic and racist comments under other videos like that... but in hawaii they are not Italian, so you don't do it! LMAO
Bellissime immagini grazie
Spicy, mate! Spicy!
You had me at Pistachio Festival!
Thereâs some wonderful views there - I wonder if those older rail cars have now all been retired...
Ur growing fast
**Beautiful** area!
It's very pretty there.
great loved it shame it was not longer, it seemed to end to soon :-)
This company that runs this line does not need insurance as the insurers said they were already covered. Lovely video, great straightforward presentation. Really interesting.
What a nice train đđŒ
If I ever go back to Sicily I need to ride this line!
I have a feeling I would be rather in the modern diesel trains looking at the old-timer trains than the other way round LOL.
Ha, that's not a bad idea :)
I remember visiting Wetzlar by car and parking in the car park there and taking most of the cityscapes from the top of the car park as it was the only place where you didn't see the car park from. The cathedral in Wetzlar is fascinating as it is both a Lutheran and a Catholic cathedral!
my dad's family is from mt etna so i've spent a lot of time in sicily/around mt etna. my parents say i've been on this train. however, it must have been when i was a toddler bc i have absolutely zero memories of it. we're always taking the car when we're there đ
I'd be visiting that pistachio fest this year. Thanks, COVID.
The real question is: why they shouldnât?
Only just found your videos Tim and have been binge watching today. Perfect for lockdown Sunday. I donât live far from HA HA road and am originally from Luxembourg (loved the Luxembourg vs Netherlands one). Keep it going (lockdown or not)
could you cover the old cog railway that went up to Asiago Italy maybe?
I took a similar train down south with my bike. As you can see, they're hard to fit into those carriages, so the conductor put us first class. It wasn't as fancy as you'd think :D.
Awesome. I was there at one point al hyped to get on the train. Staff said that it did not go at that Dayđđ
You haven't mentioned that Nelson was made Duke of Bronte
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronte,_Sicily
It's also possible that the famed Brontë family indirectly took their name from the town.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bront%C3%AB_family
Alistair Maclean: creates action thriller novel entitled Death! Train!
Tim Traveller: rides and makes informative video about narrow-gauge railway on Volcano! Train!
Pretty
Tim: "there are very few places in the world where they combine vintage transport and vulcanos quite like they do here"
Circumvesuviana in Neaples: "Am I a joke to you?"
Few is not none.
@@laurencefraser you must be fun at parties
You should come visit Naples and itâs railways that goes trough and on volcanos
Epic
Es hat SpaĂ gemacht, mit dem Alten Zug đ
im FrĂŒhjahr, rund um den Ătna đ zu fahren.
Ach ja, hatte noch eine Flasche đ·Rotwein,
Ciabatta und Chili - Pecorino dabei. đ
Not only pistachios. Some of Scily's finest wine comes from the slopes of Etna.
There used to be a funicular railway up Vesuvius. It got kyboshed in the late 19th century eruption
Indonesia is made of hundreds of active volcano, several of them have histories of eruption with VEI 6 or above, and their people build an entire civilization around it.
VOCanoes are just terrible colonial machines to keep the Indonesians in check.
@@hendrikdependrik1891 G E K O L O N I S E E R D : Nature edition
If you want vulcanos and cable trains or old railways come to Naples we have plenty of those
Did you reach the summit, and if so, how? Only active volcano I went to was Mount Taal and I had to take a boat then we rode horses to the top.
How did I never see this video before?
These are great videos! How many languages can you speak?
Ever wanted to see a volcano up close, but no interest in climbing? The Sicilians got you covered!
im glad the volcano I live on is not active anymore xD
The height varies because it depends on the amount of lava in the chambers beneath. Much like how full your hot lava bottle is before bedtime.
Mmmm... Pistachios...
I was there a couple years ago. However it was some kind of special day so it was closed :/
Was this railway built so they could evacuate the area? It's clear it's well used.
The trains and stations are not vintage it's just how it is in southern Italy
No it's not, this isn't FS
You want to start worrying when you find a train _inside_ a volcano...
Because then you know you're in a mad scientist's lair! ;)
So unbelievably, as I'm certainly no mountain climber and never was, there IS a mountain that I've climbed, but you haven't. Yes, in the autumn of 1977 We (three high school teachers and two high school classes, including me) spent a week in Sicily, and we did go to the summit and looked down the crater.
At the time there was a movie being recorded near the station below the peak involving actors dressed as prehistoric people and wearing prosthetic faces and hands. But their sitting quietly drinking coffee (presumably between takes) somewhat broke the illusion of the wild, dangerous and untameable. But they seemed to fit right in with the surrounding barren landscape. I wonder if I'd have been scared to meet one of them outside.
Trying to come up with something funny or useful to say, but can't think of a good Riposto. OTOH, Randazzo was a great place to stay, and FCE a great way to get there.
Welp, at least this explains why pistachios are so expensive đ
Those aren't railcars, they're diesel multiple units or DEMUs.
And now I know where they settled
etna crabappel?
What is the track gauge?
950 mm
it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrovia_Circumetnea
Alex La Rosa - Thank you.
Alex La Rosa - Thanks again.
@The Tim Traveler >>> One day, I bet their ridership is just going to _ERUPT...đđđ_
Interesting. Need to learn Italian to read the train schedule.
...Helllllllllooooooooo
More around the volcano and not up
by any means
4:05 / 4:06
Joke's on him: Every train in Italy is "vintage".
Intamin Silly comment as inaccurate as to fact as it is misleading in in judgement - many of the trains are amongst the fastest in Europe and the prices, given how expensive Italy is in general, are extremely reasonable.
Did not know the AGVs are already considered vintage.
When we took the trains (Fiumicino-Roma-Firenze-Venezia-Milano-Roma) on our honeymoon in 2001, the trains were (a) almost all on time and (b) almost all ETR500 high-speed trains, and VERY comfortable. The only train that left a bit late was from Venezia to Milano. It could also be considered vintage, because it had one of those cool articulated Italian locomotives, and traditional carriages with compartments for six people. (And most of the way, it was just my wife and I. It was actually my favourite train trip of the lot.) The reason why it left late, though, was because the mechanics were delayed. And THAT is typically Italian, having some old arcane law stating that you need to have a team of mechanics on board. Incidentally, the trip from and to Firenze, through Toscana, is breathtakingly beautiful, even by Italian standards.
The Italian railway system is vast and has rolling stock of all generations, from old to the most modern ones like the Frecciarossa and AGV.
That's absolutely not true
Never Pompeii a country twice...
"villages"
*The tens of of thousands of people living in each one of these "villages"* àČ _àČ
Anyways great video, I see you even added subtitles :D
The circum is a very important infrastructure for us, and a new underground railway is in the works âąïž
It's often easy to forget the touristic importance of the "littorina" đ so I'm happy if more people get to know about it.
Ps: *only* Bronte's pistacchio is *real* pistacchio đ
Really good - very helpful; great to here the Italian names pronounced correctly rather than the usual massacre inflicted by British vloggers and the even worse carnage inflicted by those from the US.
That said, you bottled-out of correcting the usual Anglicised mispronunciation of âpistacchioâ!
It's what they're called all over the world. If you call them "pistakkio", nobody knows what you're talking about.
Severity One The word is Italian and the correct pronunciation is as you explained.
I just think that the anglicisation of Italian words, and the often even worse American English pronunciation (because âtâ is so often pronounced as a âdâ as in âgeladoâ instead of âgelatoâ) is simply lazy, ugly and disrespectful.
âTagg-lee-a-tellyâ (tagliatelle), brush-ettaâ or the even worse âbrush-eddaâ (bruschetta), as just two common examples are horrible, and if foreigners felt free to mangle English pronunciation as badly, they would be corrected whether in UK, US, Australia or any other English speaking country.
@@elaineblackhurst1509 It's not just the English speaking. You don't want to know what a Spaniard called a Lamborghini (an orange Gallardo, by the way) that we saw parked casually on a small square in Rome...
Even though Italian has an extremely predictable orthography (especially when compared to French and English), the differences with the phonology in phonemes like "gli", "che", "chi", etc, can be confusing for those who are unfamiliar with the language.
Somehow the video is very choppy. A frame rate or compression problem?
Do they have to abide by disability rules?
You never even went close to the volcano.. CLICKBAIT!
Tim sounds a lot less enthusiastic in this video, as if he's kinda bored, and tbh, I am too. Not his most fascinating video.