Messina Review: Monkey Music Mini Trains and Finding the City's Beating Heart

After a final breakfast, we said farewell to our hotel and this lovely town situated above the sea, then made our way to the bus station. We caught the late morning bus down to Taormina-Giardini Station where we boarded the train to Messina. 

The fifty-five-minute ride was good, with modern carriages and comfortable seats, and with views of the sea, time passed quickly. However, leaving the station and heading into the city wasn't what we were expecting. Messina looked old and run-down, with many areas of roads and footpaths in need of repairs. Being back in the traffic—where Italians just don’t abide by the road rules—brought us back to reality and kicked our brains into another gear.

We decided to walk the fourteen-minute trip to our hotel, which turned out to be no easy task. It was hard to tell whether we were on a footpath or a road; the sidewalks were missing tiles, and dodging the holes was even worse than dragging a suitcase over cobblestones.

Dodging potholes and people became part of the game until we finally reached our accommodation, “La Residenza.” It’s only a small hotel, but it features a large modern room, a huge bathroom, a kitchen, and a couple of balconies. Breakfast was also included in the price and seating was in their dining room downstairs, overall this is a great little Hotel and has officially raised our score for Messina to a four out of ten.

After unpacking, we walked out to find a restaurant. We didn’t have to walk far, as we found one just around the corner called “1983 Number One.” It has the largest menu selection of any restaurant we’ve ever seen—it even features a horse burger (which I thought about) We both ordered a burger, and they were delicious; it was one of the best we've had in a long time and highly recommended! - A T-bone steak was AU$121.00 p/kg and by the looks of them in the showcase display, they weren't too far off that weight either.

Messina Hop-On-Hop-Off Mini Train With Wind Up Monkey Music - Give it a Miss!

We needed to walk off our meal, so we headed down toward the pier where a cruise ship was docked. There wasn’t much to see down that way, except from the usual dockside restaurants and cafes lying in wait for unwary tourists, but they too were quiet.

Leanne then spotted a hop-on-hop-off train—much like the one we took in Tarragona (Spain)— I was dragged along to "be a tourist." The train took us past several Messina landmarks, including a stop for a photo shoot at a lookout point. The forty-five-minute ride with the other five people (three looking like Mafia who didn't smile once) wasn't what we were expecting, the commentary from the audio was first read in Italian, then in English but by then we were way past the landmark, so I tuned out. Again the day was hot and we could have spent the 30 Euros elsewhere, way overpriced. Along with the unrelenting wind-up barrel music which you would expect from a street vendor with a monkey, being played over and over again!

In the end it was just terrible! but I don’t think Messina has a lot to offer tourists—except for the World's Largest Astronomical Clock, which the train didn't even take us to see! Someone prove me wrong, but at this stage it's worth giving a miss. It’s mainly a port city with ferries carting people back and forth from the mainland in about forty minutes and the train also gets ferried across if you’re travelling to Rome.

The shops and clothing in Messina are so much cheaper than what we’ve seen in other places, giving the entire city a real working-class vibe. It felt like stepping back in time, with a lot of teens sitting in the park, just gathering and talking in groups like we used to in the eighties. There was hardly a mobile phone to be seen among them—they were simply enjoying themselves. I also noticed a lot of men have neck tattoos who seem to work in restaurants, and they all appear to know each other. And of course, there were plenty of older people just shuffling along, getting nowhere in a hurry.

Messina was virtually flattened in a 1908 earthquake including its historic centre, so while it still has some old charm left, it's mostly modern architecture with worn potholed roads and footpaths. It’s a lived-in city, and you can’t compare it to tourist hotspots. It's probably a place we wouldn't come back to or recommend visiting longer than an over night stay, I didn't find it appealing, Unless you visit for a shopping spree where you could save yourself money rather than shopping in Taormina or Cefalù.

Heading back to the hotel, we were hot and needed a granita. We found a local place that had some, so we ordered a couple, and I also had a frozen or creamed coffee while we waited. I had calculated it should cost around 11.50 Euros, so I got all my change out, but when she said 4.70, I was nearly blown away. It just goes to show how much tourist hot spots charge.

Tonight I headed out in search of a supermarket to grab some rolls, ham, cheese and dessert—the usual eat in food. I Googled "A supermarket near me," and it selected one about six blocks away, a ten-minute walk. Leanne didn't go, so I set off hoping to make it back without being mugged.

The first few dimly lit streets weren't too bad. There were a couple of small pizza places, a few family-run restaurants, and some shops still open. As I got to a main area, I noticed families everywhere. This part of the city had old tram tracks running through it which are no longer used and being taken up, and they were doing some work on the footpath. They were spending money in doing this part of the city up as there were major stores I knew, such as H&M and Zara plus heaps of other, all doing a roaring trade. When I came to the supermarket, I discovered it was downstairs in a large mall, so I was thinking Messina isn’t as bad as I thought, we'd gone to the wrong area and hadn't done our research.

The mall area must have brought out all the nonnas and their daughters, as the temperature was just perfect around 7:00 PM. The old boys were sitting on concrete steps, just talking, watching, smoking and probably talking about the day or the weather. It seemed like their nightly routine. I went a different way back, and there were eateries open and little bars where locals were hanging out. It looks as though Messina does have a beating heart, every so slowly, however has it changed my mind? No, but I now rate it a five out of ten.

Tomorrow we head up the coast to Cefalù which is a two-hour train journey.