Travel Guide Santa Marina Di Salina

Once covered with vines, Salina was later enriched with olive trees, poplars, chestnut trees, caper trees, fruit trees and many other trees. At once rural, wooded and maritime, Salina is exceptional among its sisters for its greenery, its intense cultivation and the profusion of its fresh water. Quiet and harmonious, with its white houses scattered in the countryside, it has the charm of serenity. The second largest island of the archipelago (27 km2) and mountainous, it is the highest of the Aeolian Islands. The island is made up of two main old stratovolcanoes, the Fossa delle Felci mountains - the highest point at 962 m - and the Porri mountains, separated by the peaceful Valdichiesa pass. It is from its particular silhouette that it takes its ancient name from Didyme meaning "twin". But it also has four minor volcanoes. It is also the only one that is not part of the municipality of Lipari: it is made up of three small municipalities grouping the 2,300 inhabitants of the island. Smaller are the villages of Lingua (at the southeastern tip of the island), and Rinella, the island's second port where boats and hydrofoils dock, is isolated in a cove on the southern coast. Santa Marina, the most populated town and the main port for hydrofoils and ferries, has a beautiful pebble beach. A pretty village with typical Aeolian style houses. It is also the starting point for many sea excursions along the island's indented coast. To get from Santa Marina to Rinella, you have to take a boat or the only road on the island, which is tiny and winding and passes along the northern coast, then climbs inland to the heights of Mount Fossa delle Felci, where Valdichiesa and Leni are located, and then descends to Rinella.