Taormina: sea, ancient ruins, and volcanic dust

It is so unbelievably sad that Italy is living through really dark times at the moment. For a traveler like myself it is double-fold devastating: only few countries can boast amazing landscapes, rich culture, and delicious cuisine compared to that of Italy. In these dire times, I would like to think about all the beautiful things that Italy is home to and celebrate its potential for cultural visits which we all can hopefully soon enjoy again.

This story is of a little town of Taormina which finds itself perched upon a tall rock on the Western shore of Sicily. Taormina is a tiny city and is probably not the first one that you think of when someone mentions Sicily. Most of the travelers use the town as the base for conquering Etna, one of the world’s most famous volcanoes, and, to be honest, so did we, but this little Mediterranean town certainly has a charm of its own!

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Taormina and the “Etna hike”

It is generally known that software engineers are grumpy and introvert. Therefore, any contact between them is either because of work-related communication or just a pure coincidence. Software companies are, on the other hand, interested in having their employees to at least not be afraid of each other. Everyone solves this problem in their own way. Google, for instance, from time to time throws 2-3 day offsites for its employees with a purpose of team building and creation of inter-team connections.

Just like that, after just one month after my start date I found myself on Sicily with a bunch of Googlers from my and neighbor teams. Read more“Taormina and the “Etna hike””