Parco Regionale
Parco Regionale in Sicily
16 towns
Sicily holds 16 Parco Regionale sites inside our catalogue. They cluster in the Palermo, Catania, and Agrigento provinces.
The three most recognised in our catalogue are Sambuca di Sicilia, Nicolosi, and Castiglione di Sicilia. 13 more towns carry the mark alongside them.
Sambuca di Sicilia
Province: Agrigento · 350 m
An Arab-founded hill town in the Belice valley, named Borgo dei Borghi in 2016, still called Zabut in living memory before 1923.
Nicolosi
Province: Catania · 698 m
The southern gateway to Etna at 698 meters, twice destroyed by the 1669 eruption, base camp for the volcano cable car at Rifugio Sapienza.
Castiglione di Sicilia
Province: Catania · 621 m
A hill town on the north flank of Etna at 621 meters, base camp for the Alcantara valley and the volcano's most serious red wines.
Cefalù
Province: Palermo · 16 m
A Norman cathedral at the foot of a 270-meter rock on the Tyrrhenian coast, founded by Roger II in 1131 and on the UNESCO Arab-Norman list since 2015.
Geraci Siculo
Province: Palermo · 1,077 m
A Madonie ridge village at 1,077 meters, capital of the Ventimiglia marquisate from 1258 and the first marquisate granted in Sicily.
Petralia Soprana
Province: Palermo · 1,147 m
The highest village in the Madonie at 1,147 meters, RAI Borgo dei Borghi 2018 winner, sitting above 80 kilometers of salt tunnels.
Petralia Sottana
Province: Palermo · 1,000 m
A Madonie village at 1,000 meters, the only Bandiera Arancione in Sicily, and the headquarters of the Parco delle Madonie.
Troina
Province: Enna · 1,121 m
At 1,121 meters on the Nebrodi ridge, the first capital and first bishopric the Normans set up in Sicily after taking it from the Arabs.
Cammarata
Province: Agrigento · 700 m
A Sicani town at 700 meters on the northeast slope of Monte Cammarata, the 1,578-meter peak that gives the comune its name and shape.
Castelbuono
Province: Palermo · 423 m
A Madonie town at 423 meters around the Ventimiglia castle, where manna is still tapped from ash trees and Fiasconaro bakes the panettone.
Polizzi Generosa
Province: Palermo · 917 m
A Madonie town at 917 meters inside a UNESCO Global Geopark, hazelnut country and the birthplace of Domenico Dolce.
Sant'Alfio
Province: Catania · 537 m
An Etna village at 537 meters where the world's largest and oldest chestnut tree has been measured at over 57 meters in girth.
Taormina
Province: Messina · 204 m
A 204-meter terrace above the Ionian with Etna on the southern horizon, a Greek-Roman theatre carved into the rock since the third century BC.
San Marco d'Alunzio
Province: Messina · 540 m
A hilltop borgo at 540 meters built in pink Aluntina marble, Robert Guiscard's first Sicilian base for the eleventh-century Norman conquest.
Giarre
Province: Catania · 81 m
An Etna town that split from Mascali in 1815 and built a neoclassical duomo, with two bell towers framing the volcano behind it.
Randazzo
Province: Catania · 750 m
A medieval town in black lava stone at 750 meters on Etna's north foot, with three quarter churches for Latins, Greeks and Lombards.
Subscribe — free
Get the best guides on hidden Italian towns.
One letter on Sundays. The week’s town, with the photo, the food, the festa. Free, by Peter & Sophia from Pietrasanta.
Substack sends a confirmation link to your inbox. The signup finishes when it’s clicked.
From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Putignano
Province: Bari
Europe's longest-running carnival — Putignano Carnevale has run continuously since 1394, with 631 years of cartapesta papier-mâché floats, a 26,000-resident Murgia town on the Bari–Lecce plateau, and the Grotta del Trullo karst cave inside the centro.
Pistoia
Province: Pistoia
Italy's nursery capital and the medieval Tuscan rival that gave its name to the pistol — a quietly extraordinary centro storico of zebra-striped Romanesque churches, Andrea della Robbia's polychrome frieze on the Ospedale del Ceppo, and Italy's Capital of Culture 2017, all 30 minutes from Florence by train.
Tropea
Province: Vibo Valentia
Cliff town on a tufa headland over the Tyrrhenian Coast of the Gods, with a Norman monastery on a sea rock.
Caldes
Province: Trento
A scattered Val di Sole commune on the Noce, six hamlets gathered around a thirteenth-century tower-house castle that once belonged to the Thun family.
Cantiano
Province: Pesaro e Urbino
A border borgo at 374 meters under Monte Catria on the old Via Flaminia, known for the Good Friday Turba and the sour-cherry visciola harvest.