Ten years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I still reflect on the cruel irony of exploring an active volcano – Stromboli on Sicily’s Aeolian Islands -- on one of the most devastatingly explosive days in American history. As the days progressed, my husband Joe and I tried to process the magnitude of this tragedy from afar as we contemplated our return to Chicago in the midst of all U.S. airports closed to international flights. We also became apprehensive about flying altogether and, at the same time, were eager to be close to family and friends back home. During those fragile and uncertain times, toward the end of a trip spent on these distinct islands off Sicily’s northern coast, we encountered an outpouring of compassion and support from local Italians and fellow travelers from around the world.
We seemed suspended between heaven and hell – uplifted by the unconditional kindness of strangers on a string of semi-isolated islands yet deflated by this mortal blow to humankind. Strangely, our physical environment on that cataclysmic day mirrored those extremes. We arrived by ferry on Lipari on September 10, 2001.
The next day we planned to take an excursion to the blue-and-white, Greek-influenced island of Panarea, culminating in a visit to Stromboli, whose volcano of the same name inspired director Roberto Rossellini to film his classic 1950 political commentary, Stromboli, amid the island’s real and figurative desolation. Calm waters and sunny skies greeted us the morning of September 11, 2001. We set sail on a boat filled entirely with Italian tourists to Panarea. We were constantly reminded of the durability of nature. Rocks as old as time poked majestically out of the green-blue sea and led toward the sprawling volcano, with its fiercely etched crevices, shrouded in a perpetual gray haze.
Panarea, considered the most jetset of the Aeolian Islands for its swank beaches and high-priced realty, sports an unexpectedly shabby port with rotting fishing boats and a disheveled snack bar. Visitors need only to probe deeper up whitewashed steps and a cornucopia of bougainvillea to discover its more picture-perfect attributes. We had a good four hours to explore Panarea’s abandoned lemon-yellow Church of San Pietro and a Bronze Age archaeological park consisting of stones placed in mysterious circular formations. The island owes its name to a much-debated ancient Byzantine term, panaria, among whose definitions range from unconnected to the damned (an allusion to its off-center geographic location and proximity to numerous shipwrecks). We didn’t have a care in the world that afternoon. We were actually happy to be cut off, for a brief time, from our frenetic urban lives. Little did we know how helplessly disconnected we would feel only a few hours later.
A sweet little gray cat followed us all the way to the slightly secluded Ristorante da Paolino, where a beaming nonna surrounded by grandchildren directed us to an outdoor table on an elevated terrace facing Stromboli head on. Every few minutes, the volcano would casually blow round smoke rings into the air like a heftier version of Lewis Carroll’s hookah-puffing caterpillar. I remember the nonna was peeling a cantaloupe and passing around sloped servings at a long rectangular table. For most of the two hours we spent there dining on eggplant-ricotta pasta and grilled pesce spada, the serene natural world around us served as a visual metaphor for world peace. Unbeknownst to us, taking into account the six-hour time difference, our lunch paralleled the attacks in New York City. Even after all these years, I still suffer unbearable guilt over our quiet pleasure at a time of such unspeakable pain.
The same gray cat waited for us and shadowed us all the way to the port. By late afternoon, Joe and I boarded the boat that slowly crawled toward Stromboli, which is such a glowering presence we believed it could swallow up intruders. It’s an island that manages to be both enchanting and creepy. The chronic heart-piercing screams of ring-neck doves seemed foreboding in light of what we would soon learn. On Stromboli, visitors follow one main deserted road that wraps partially around the sea and faces the lonely Gothic crag of an island called Strombolicchio (topped with an equally bone-chilling lighthouse). The volcano itself was so overpowering, it seemed to blot out the sun.
The historic center is located in an elevated cluster, whose central landmark is the Church of San Vincenzo. We kept heading for its rounded campanile, but somehow took a wrong turn and found ourselves approaching a black void so close to the volcano we could feel its stinging embers. At this point in our travels, we both decided not to climb any more volcanoes, especially one of the world’s most treacherous and one that has claimed many unsuspecting victims who have accidentally fallen into its vaporous fog-engulfed crater.
A few people were scattered on the black-sand beaches, giving the impression that they were sunbathing in hell. Lava and calcified rocks loomed before us. To our surprise, we landed in a dense cornfield – eventually extricating ourselves and cutting through a private backyard that led to the central cactus-and-caper-clogged road. I felt like Ingrid Bergman in the movie, Stromboli, getting lost in the island’s maze-like streets – a symbolic way of showing the difficulty of escaping Old World strictures. Speaking of the famed Swedish actress, we happened upon a faded cranberry cottage with a plaque that blatantly identified it as the house where Rossellini and Bergman “had their love affair.”
We soon reached the bulbous-domed Baroque Church of San Vincenzo, around which elderly men conversed on benches and boys kicked a soccer ball. The piazza faced a startling expanse of ocean. Dusk was slowly descending, and Joe wanted to take in the power of the sea from this dramatic promontory. I slipped inside the church and was immediately struck by the hand-painted details of the statues and their richly embroidered vestments. All wore agonized expressions, and one flower-ensconced Virgin Mary statue was crowned with an electric halo whose bulbs spelled out “I am the Immaculate Conception.” Another showed a mournful Madonna in a black shroud; one scene posited figures of a priest and a nun fervently clutching rosaries at the foot of Christ’s cross.
Just as I was contemplating the excessive degree of anguish in these statues’ faces, Joe walked into the church ashen-faced. “I think the World Trade Center was bombed,” he said as he grabbed my hand and led me to a gift shop where the locals were huddled around a tiny television. I only recall, at that moment, seeing on that small screen black smoke pouring from the Twin Towers and a banner announcing “America Under Attack.” We broke down, as the Italians consoled us and helped us try to make calls to the United States even though we could not get through. We then learned of the Pentagon attack and crash of Flight 93 in Pennsylvania – our heads and hearts reeling as we watched the tragedy unfold from the foot of an active volcano.
The journey back to Lipari was an unpleasant one on so many levels. We dragged ourselves to the port in almost total darkness. As we descended, a profound emptiness engulfed us; our worldview grew grimmer with each heavy step. The silence around us was both crushing and reassuring. Once on the boat, we found ourselves surrounded by sympathetic and equally shell-shocked passengers. As Joe and I nestled inside on a long bench, the captain announced that we were going to dock for a while at Strombolicchio to watch the Sciara del Fuoco, or trail of neon-orange lava pouring down the volcano Stromboli – to us, it looked like the Twin Towers and we turned away in horror. Shortly after, the captain warned us of very rough seas and a long, uncomfortable ride back to Lipari. The combination of mare agitato and the trauma of 9/11, needless to say, resulted in a rash of seasickness.
From Lipari’s Marina Corta, we practically hobbled back to Hotel Carasco, a seafront property that during low tide, we could access by cutting across the beach. Now at high tide and close to midnight, we had to take the long way around. We and our fellow guests embraced as the one television in the lobby perpetually broadcast the carnage. We each took turns making calls and sending emails to the United States. It was impossible to sleep, so I stared for hours at the moonlit ocean outside on our balcony. As if on cue, someone in a nearby room had the radio on. It was playing Maureen McGovern’s The Morning After, the theme song from the 1970’s disaster movie, The Poseidon Adventure. Our nation was living its own disaster movie.
The next day, Joe and I wandered around Lipari distractedly and discussed alternatives if U.S. airports were closed indefinitely. Our day became a surreal blur of what ifs and Plan Bs, as our trip drew to a close. We decided to leave Lipari earlier than anticipated to catch a hydrofoil to Palermo before more predicted rough waters. In Palermo, we spent a day with our friends at their Self-Service restaurant, where scores of somber-faced relatives poured in to express their condolences. Joe and I felt like the immediate family at a wake, where mourners were lamenting America’s sudden loss of invincibility.
Originally scheduled to fly the next day from Palermo-Milan/Milan-Chicago, we felt it best to stick to the first part of the itinerary. Once in Milan, we met more friends. For that one night in Palermo, we stayed at Hotel Porto Rais, a Moorish-style refuge on the ocean and five minutes from Punta Rais Airport. Paradoxically, the décor favored artistic recreations of battles between Crusades-era knights and Saracens. At the hotel’s palm tree-lined restaurant, with vintage ceiling fans, we could have been exiled to Rick’s Café in Casablanca. Here, we met a group of sympathetic Alitalia pilots who encouraged us to stay close to an international airport for the imminent reopening of international flights to the U.S.
Before we left for Milan, a compassionate agent at the Palermo airport provided us with a reliable toll-free number to Alitalia for checking on the status of airport reopenings. In Milan, our friends from nearby Parabiago greeted us and embarked on a challenging search for a hotel – all the ones in the area were booked either due to 9/11 or to the Formula 1 Grand Prix that weekend in the Lombardian town of Monza. They found a rather secluded B&B, where we stayed a few extra days – still in limbo about how we would get home. One evening, we all went out to dinner to the preserved medieval town of Morimondo, past the region’s arborio rice fields. We dined on comforting risotto dishes and wood-fired pizza at Trattoria del Priore, where the owner and staff in this warm copper-pot-lined eatery embraced us. They even let us peek in on one of their numerous dachshunds that had recently given birth to a vigorous tail-wagging litter of puppies.
Returning to our B&B after midnight, Joe and I decided to call the toll-free number. To our shock, an Alitalia agent told us that U.S. airports would most likely open to international flights that morning. Because she could not reserve a flight for us over the phone, she recommended we arrive at Milan’s Malpensa Airport no later than 4 a.m. and just get in line. We immediately called our friends, who drove back to meet us and took us straight to the airport. Once we got there, thousands of passengers had the same idea. After five hours in line, Joe and I were put on a long waiting list for a rare direct flight to Chicago. It seemed highly unlikely we were ever going to get on and soon learned that it would take at least five days before we could be booked on another flight. Then we noticed that Italians and other travelers planning trips to America began relinquishing their seats to Americans anxious to return home.
Several hours, delays, and white-knuckle-waiting later – and just when we resolved to being stranded for close to a week – an Alitalia agent called our names. Joe and I were literally the last two people to board that plane. We ran to the gate in what felt like slow motion. The passengers cheered and applauded when we landed at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. Then we entered a city draped in American flags.
A decade later, I still have flashbacks of that fateful day on Stromboli when our world – and unshaken sense of security -- seemed to crash and burn. I continue to question whether time is really capable of healing all wounds. But I do know that our experience in Italy following one of the most horrific attacks on American soil renewed our faith in the kindness and generosity of humanity.
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