🌍 Italy Road Trip Post 2 of 2 - The Volcano Was Already Erupting When We Arrived
Sicily, Mt. Etna, a dog crate emergency, and the rental car I left at the curb
This is Part 2 of the Naples to Sicily road trip series. If you missed Part 1 — GPS cliff roads, racial profiling at the Ischia ferry, and a lightning strike four feet from the car — start there first.
The Ferry, and What Was Waiting on the Other Side
The crossing from Villa San Giovanni to Messina is short — maybe twenty minutes — and you leave your car on the lower deck and hang out above while the strait of water separating the Italian mainland from Sicily passes underneath you. It feels like a threshold. You are crossing into somewhere different, somewhere older, somewhere that has been conquered and left and reconquered so many times that the island eventually just absorbed everyone who came for it and became its own thing entirely.
We drove south toward Zafferana Etnea, a village on the eastern slope of Mt. Etna. We arrived July 4th.
Ash, ash, and more ash.
It melted things it touched. I don’t know how our rental car was not damaged.
As if the island was welcoming us with its own near-death experience, the volcano was erupting.
Mt. Etna on "America's Birthday"
Side note on the quotes: I'm Taino Latina. The 4th of July has a very different meaning to me.
I want to be precise about what erupting means in this context, because "eruption" covers a lot of ground — from "inconvenient tourist delay" to "actual emergency." What we encountered was the kind of eruption Etna does regularly: lava flowing on the upper slopes, an ash plume visible from a hundred kilometers away, activity that locals monitor with the calm familiarity of people who have lived next to an active volcano for three thousand years.
What it meant for us practically: everything was covered in ash. The rental car. The terrace of the villa. The plants in the garden. The chairs we tried to sit in outside. A fine grey layer on everything, like the mountain was making sure you didn't forget it was there.
I cooked a lot that week. Jovan went to the gym every day — I drove him there and came back to the villa with my coffee and the ash and the view of the mountain smoking in the distance. We were supposed to take a sunset tour of Mt. Etna on July 13th. I had booked it early on
I notified the guide we couldn’t make it. I knew this would be one I would regret forever. The only flight that would allow Midnight on board was that same day we had the tour. Check-out was the next day. If we missed that one flight, we would need to stay another week when another dog spot was open in the hold of the plane. Neither of us wanted another week in Zafferana Etnea. The town is peaceful and the volcano is genuinely astonishing, but we had run out of things to do by day two. Some places are best in short doses.
We chose the dog. We chose our next destination. Athens.
Dog Logistics on an Erupting Volcano
Now, about traveling internationally with a large dog: the logistics of his transport will become the central organizing fact of your entire life. Why do I put myself through the torture? We’re full-time digital nomads since 2022 (while Jovan was still in High School doing it from planes, trains and cars) exploring the world while simultaneously looking for a new home. We were boots-on-the-ground exploring to check out the vibes of these hyped up places. We found out in October /November 2025 how fictitiously hyped up Europe is.
But, why do I do it? Because my son won’t leave his dog behind. And I promised we would keep our dogs- Midnight and Nala (the beautiful pitbull)- in the family until they died. We have had to get rid of pet dogs in the past and it was so painful. I refused to do it again. So, here we are, traveling the world with what I call a “mini horse.”
Midnight weighs over thirty-five kilograms (75 lbs). He cannot fly in the cabin the way he does to and from the USA. He flies in cargo, in a crate that meets IATA standards for his size — structurally sound, properly ventilated, and correctly dimensioned for the airline's requirements.
On a Sicilian island experiencing an active volcanic eruption, I did not have this crate. The crates that large dogs require are rarely kept in stock at regular pet shops.
I started driving to shops. There was no point in calling — hardly anyone speaks English, and don't even think about social media channels. Non-existent in these parts of the world to most of the population. One shop caught my attention. One of the owners — the wife — understood the situation and did what I have come to recognize as the particular generosity of people who work with animals. She made calls, found a supplier, and helped me place a next-day delivery order on an island whose infrastructure was currently managing the side effects of a volcanic eruption.
I have a story about what happened in that shop. It's its own post. But I will say this: she was everything her husband was not. He ignored me until he saw that our conversation continued and I was looking to spend some serious money there. About $189. But that’s not the story- I’m used to that kind of dismissal from a certain kind of people. The story is his behavior towards his own wife. Ugh.
The crate arrived. We built it. We made the flight.
Because of the crate, we could not fit all the suitcases, Midnight, and the crate in the rental car at the same time. I had to make two trips to the airport which was about 40 minutes away. That was fun.
To this day, the photos and review I posted of that pet shop are the most viewed entries in my Google Maps review history. I am a Local Guide. I have reviewed restaurants, hotels, trails, and viewpoints in over 14 countries. The emergency dog crate on a volcanic island gets the most traffic.
I understand. It's a good story.
The Rental Car Confession
But one more thing before we rush to our flight with the mini-horse in tow.
Because of the two trips to the airport, I was running out of time. I didn't have time to drop off the car at the rental company and then take a taxi. We still had to put the crate together. It wouldn't fit in the car fully assembled, so we had to remove the screws holding the top half to the bottom half. I had to make a decision and I had to make it fast.
I said "f#@! it" and left the rental car in front of the Catania airport where you only park to unload.
Not in a parking structure. Not at a designated return area. In front of the terminal — the way you do when you are a person who has just spent thirty minutes on a busy departures curb assembling a dog crate large enough for a thirty-five-kilogram tripawed dog while simultaneously managing check-in paperwork and a flight countdown, and the car goes where it goes because the dog and the flight are what matter right now.
I did not notify the rental company where the car was for approximately twenty-four hours. I was already settled in Athens by the time I sent them a message. The thing is, we left a day early, so they weren't looking for the car yet. It wasn't late. And — the crazy part — I left the car unlocked with the key inside.
The car was fine. The rental company was not thrilled. But what could they do? I was already in Athens.
I am telling you this because the version of this story where I handled everything smoothly and professionally is not available. The version where we made it — all three of us, dog crate and volcanic ash and lightning-scorched nerves and everything — is the only one I have.
And we made it.
What I Know Now That I Didn't Know Then
The cliff road changed how I drive in new countries. I pull up satellite view before I commit to any road that starts narrowing. I submit Google Maps correction requests when I find roads that no longer exist the way the map says they do. I have done this in every country where I've rented a car. The map is always too optimistic.
The double insurance in Naples changed how I handle rental counters. I do not let anyone rush me. I ask for a copy of everything before I sign anything. The agent in Naples was doing his job. I was doing mine poorly. That's not his fault.
The crate from Catania? We abandoned it at the Athens airport. The taxi didn't even want to give us a ride with Midnight, but we had prebooked and added it to the notes. The booking company failed to notify the driver or as it almost always happens- he didn’t read them. It was a regular car, not a van. That changed how I plan Midnight's logistics. As we speak, we're in Türkiye for two months after finishing our second cross-country road trip. We're exiting in three weeks and will need a crate again for wherever we go next. We're still deciding on the country.
The lightning on the fence changed something harder to name — the particular feeling of the moment when things almost go wrong and then don't. The fence four feet from the car (honestly, guys I think it was closer. More like 2 feet. It was crazy close!). The crumbling road above the valley. The volcano arrival. The crate with twelve hours to spare.
None of it went wrong in any permanent way. That is the whole story. That is the only story I have to tell: that it almost went wrong, repeatedly, and then it didn't, and we kept going.
That is what the road looks like when you're actually on it.
We managed to make it to one yacht tour in Sicily and see the dolphins. Our one-week Sicily stay was mostly to catch up on work and Jovan to get back to his gym habits. At least we made it to one out of two tours I had scheduled.
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Catania airport Sicily, flying with large dog internationally, dog crate IATA standards, rental car Italy tips, Athens Greece digital nomad, Türkiye road trip dog
