Sicily Divide by Bicycle - The Island's Epic Crossroads

 "Sicily Divide by Bicycle - The Island's Epic Crossroads" is the title of the guide penned by Giovanni Guarneri, a native of Palermo, published by Terre di Mezzo (120 pages, 16 euros). It provides cyclists with routes, advice, and workshops along all of Sicily's roads and recently hit the shelves.

The guide will be introduced in Milan on November 11th at the Upcycle Milano bike cafe as part of the Trail Week organized by Bike Soul, which coordinates the regional cycling trails. "These are the general states of the trails in Italy," explained Giovanni Guarneri, who organizes the stages of the trails in Sicily. "There are about thirty of them in Italy.

"I will present the new maps of the Sicily Divide trails with various linear and loop itineraries. Cyclists are given a pass to collect stamps at various stages." The idea of organizing such routes originates from the territory. "The municipalities," Guarneri added, "already hosted tourists who went on horseback and on foot, but bicycles were missing. The Sicilian territory craves these initiatives, but lacks an official system of cycle paths. Cycle tourism is no longer a niche phenomenon. The cycle tourist generates revenue and pays tourist taxes. Last year we closed the accounts with 2 million and 750 thousand euros of revenue."

And this year things went even better. "We are closing an extraordinary season," Guarneri added. "The climate from April to today has favored us, and the flow of cycle tourists in Sicily has reached unprecedented numbers. We have tripled the numbers from 2019, the last pre-pandemic period of reference."

The itineraries are tailored for everyone and can be customized on the sicilydivide.it website. Giovanni Guarneri's Sicily Divide project received the award for second place at the Italian Cycling Tourism Oscars for the best cycle paths in Italy during the 2023 World Cyclotourism Day in Cesena.