Lipari

The pure white of the pumice quarries

The north-eastern part of the island of Lipari, and in other parts, is covered by a layer of very white pumice . This was emitted by Monte Pilato, a small hill located between the villages of Canneto and Acquacalda, in the Porticello locality. In reality, very little remains of Monte Pilato, because it had been the site of pumice mining activities since the 1960s.
 le cave di pomiceWhat remains now of Monte Pilato is a rock face around 200 metres high, white as marble seen from afar. Mining activities were halted in the mid-1990s, shortly before the Aeolian Islands became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2000. Pumice has always been a major attraction on the island.
From a naturalistic point of view, its white colour creates an almost unreal landscape. Pumice powder, the result of the erosion of the pumice banks of Monte Pilato, also covers the beach below and all the land around it, and obviously the seabed in front of it too, which has taken on a wonderful turquoise colour over time, almost like a natural swimming pool.
In this corner of paradise, the only note out of tune are the residues of the pumice industry, which have not yet been disposed of. Though the buildings of the 1960s are a wonderful example of industrial archaeology, the industries of the 1990s have left iron walkways and warehouses, soon to be disposed of. From a volcanological point of view, the pumices of Lipari are among the most famous in the world for the purity of their colour, due to the involvement of only one magma during the 19th-century eruption of Monte Pilato.

The 2002-03 eruption

Where do Vulcano’s gases come from?

The polis of the living and the necropolis of the dead

Vulcano, the youngest of the Aeolian works of art

The ancient production of salt

Volcanoes as a natural art form

The underwater fumarolic activity of Lisca Bianca

Seven islands, dozens of volcanoes

The Thermal Baths of Saint Calogerus

Salina, the green island with twin mountains

The summit craters

Tsunamis: a not uncommon phenomenon in Stromboli

Filicudi: small island, big history

Lipari Castle, “fused” with the lava

Pollara, between poetry and beauty

Stories of the sea and shipwrecks. The wrecks of the Aeolian Islands

The senses tell The summit craters

At the heart of trade in history

“Strombolian” activity in the place where its definition was born

The Gran Cratere of the Fossa: when the volcano becomes a sculptor

The Aeolian Islands, where volcanology was born

Alicudi, where time has stood still

Malvasia delle Lipari DOC

The stacks of Panarea

The pure white of the pumice quarries

The senses tell The Sciara del Fuoco

Lipari, where history intertwines with volcanoes to create archaeology

Stromboli, the volcano that breathes

The senses tell The Pumice Quarries of Lipari

Panarea and its history

Myths and legends about volcanoes

The prehistoric village of Cala Junco

The senses tell The Stacks of Panarea

The Village of Capo Graziano

Lipari at the centre of Mediterranean history

Panarea, where sea and volcanoes become sculptors

The senses tell The Village of Capo Graziano

The underwater morphological elements of the Aeolian Islands

Between brush strokes of sulphur and clouds of steam: the fumaroles of the port of Vulcano

The salt lake of Lingua

The hidden part of the Aeolian Islands

How pumice is formed

“Vulcanian” eruptions

The malleability of Vulcano’s mud

Filicudi, a submerged paradise

The senses tell The salt lake of Lingua

The Cathedral of Lipari and the Norman Cloister of the Benedictine Monastery

The Sciara del Fuoco