Syracuse

Ortigia mornings, Neapolis afternoons

Spend the first morning on Ortigia. Cross the bridge to the Temple of Apollo, browse the market in the streets just beyond it, then walk through the lanes to Piazza Duomo and the cathedral built into the Temple of Athena. Look into Santa Lucia alla Badia on the same square.

After lunch, walk down to the Fonte Aretusa and along the Foro Italico, then take a boat trip around the island from the channel by the bridges. Eat seafood on Ortigia in the evening and finish with a late walk through Piazza Duomo when it is lit up.

On day two, be at the Neapolis archaeological park at opening time, before the heat. See the Greek theatre, the Ear of Dionysius and the Roman amphitheatre, then visit the Paolo Orsi archaeological museum nearby. In the afternoon, see Caravaggio's Burial of Saint Lucy at Santa Lucia al Sepolcro, then head back to Ortigia for an aperitivo on the waterfront.

Swordfish, sea urchin and almond granita

Fish is the thing to order here. Trattorias on Ortigia build their menus around the morning catch: grilled swordfish, sea bream and pasta with sea urchin in season. The Ortigia market near the Temple of Apollo lays it all out, with stalls selling cheese, olives and snacks to eat on the spot.

For quick food, look for arancini, fried rice balls, and pastry shops selling cannoli and almond biscuits. In summer, breakfast is granita, a soft flavoured ice of almond, lemon or coffee, eaten with a brioche. The countryside around Avola, just down the coast, grows some of Sicily's best almonds, and they turn up in pastries across the province.

Many restaurants close one day a week, so check before you set out. Book ahead for dinner on summer weekends, when the best tables on Ortigia fill up.

Val di Noto excursions and the Greek drama season

The baroque towns of the Val di Noto, rebuilt after the 1693 earthquake, are the obvious day trips. Regional trains head south-west via Noto to Pozzallo in a little over an hour, then on to Modica and Ragusa, but they run Monday to Saturday only. Pozzallo is also the port for ferries to Malta.

South of Noto, the Vendicari nature reserve has wild beaches and lagoons where flamingos stop in season; you will need a car or a tour. To the north, direct trains along the coast reach Catania and Taormina.

Timing shapes a visit. Spring brings the classical drama season, when Greek tragedies are staged in the ancient theatre from about May into early summer. July and August are hot and Neapolis has little shade, so sightsee early and swim from the rocks on Ortigia in the afternoon. On 13 December the city honours Santa Lucia, its patron saint, with a procession carrying her silver statue through the streets.

Three thousand years in one city

Syracuse makes more sense once you know how many times it was rebuilt. People lived on Ortigia as early as the 14th century BC, and the Greek colony was founded in the 8th century BC, growing beyond its first walls between the 6th and 4th centuries BC.

Athens besieged it from 416 to 413 BC and lost. In 405 BC, at war with Carthage, Dionysius I moved residents off Ortigia and turned the island into a fortress. Rome took and sacked the city in 212 BC, the year Archimedes died. Arab forces took and devastated Syracuse in 878 but left their stamp on the tight street plan of Ortigia; the Normans rebuilt the Byzantine fortifications and the Aragonese added the ramparts that still ring the island.

The 1693 earthquake brought the baroque rebuild that gives Ortigia its 18th-century look, and the 1930s cut Corso Matteotti, then Via del Littorio, through the old fabric. Walking from the Temple of Apollo to the cathedral, which is built around a Greek temple to Athena, you cross most of these layers in ten minutes.

Pantalica and the Paolo Orsi museum

The UNESCO listing of 2005 covers Syracuse together with the Necropolis of Pantalica, a gorge in the Hyblaean hills where about five thousand rock-cut tombs honeycomb the limestone cliffs. The site lies inland in the hills, a car is by far the easiest way there, and the paths down to the Anapo valley are steep and unshaded, so go early with water and proper shoes.

The finds from Pantalica, excavated by Paolo Orsi between 1895 and 1910, are in the Museo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi on Via Teocrito. The museum moved there in 1988, a short walk from the Neapolis park, so the theatre, the Roman amphitheatre and the museum fit into one long day. Inside, the collections run from prehistoric Sicily through the Greek colonies to the Roman period, and they explain what you see at both Pantalica and Neapolis better than any sign on site.

The Ear of Dionysius, the Greek theatre and Arethusa's spring

The Neapolis park holds the two sights most people come for. The Greek theatre was built in the 5th century BC and enlarged by Hiero II in the 3rd century BC, and between May and June each year the Istituto Nazionale del Dramma Antico stages classical plays on its stone seats. Bring a cushion and water for evening performances.

Below it lies the Latomia del Paradiso, a quarry where the stone for the city was cut. Its most famous cavity, the Ear of Dionysius, is an artificial cave about 23 m high and up to 11 m wide, shaped like a giant earlobe. Legend says the tyrant Dionysius listened to prisoners through it; the echo is real, so try a single word at the entrance.

Back on Ortigia, the Fonte Aretusa is a freshwater spring a few steps from the sea, tied to the myth of the nymph Arethusa and the river god Alpheus, and papyrus still grows in the pool, one of the very few places in Europe where it does. At the island's southern tip, the Castello Maniace, a Swabian fortress built under Frederick II, guards the harbour mouth and has the best sea views on Ortigia.

Plan the Neapolis visit for the morning, when the stone is cool and the light falls into the quarry. In June, when the drama season is on, the park and the museum on Via Teocrito fill early, and evening tickets for the theatre often sell out weeks ahead, so book them before you book the hotel. The Pantalica gorge, by contrast, is at its best in spring, when the Anapo valley is green and the streams are running.