Sicani TET & Dirt | Scouting

I covered our earlier ventures into Monti Sicani elsewhere, but here I’ll dive a bit deeper into our local dirt scouting expeditions.

Forbidden dirt, top of Cozzo Orecchiuta. One of the many tantalizing non-trails around Palermo.

As you probably know, Palermo is surrounded by mountains. Normally, this should open up all kinds of dirt riding possibilities, but nature and man both impose their limits. Some of the hillsides are non-arable and few farm pathways have been built as a result, others are perfectly suitable for off-road, but sit behind private gates or have been set aside as hiking-only areas (photo above).

What you’re left with, as far as I can tell, generally falls into one of three categories: the TET, the lesser-known and the gray areas.

Messina – Palermo TET

One of the very first things on my list was the main branch of the Sicilian TET. I wanted to explore it ahead of our journey east hoping that it could make up a good chunk of our trip to Catania mid March. Not knowing what I would find, I decided to first venture out alone and not risk dragging Min into a repeat of our Sardinia TET adventure.

I set about the task by downloading the official gpx data right from the TET site. The gpx promises to take you from downtown right into the hills. The first part is true, the data starts downtown Palermo, but soon the more nuanced Italian reality kicks in. Once out of Palermo proper, the trail leads through the rather depressing town of Boccadifalco where it attempts to cross private neighborhood gates separating the well-off from the much less fortunate. No golden pass in hand, I had a second look at the map and realized that the first likely dirt would have to be several kilometers up the mountain.

So I bypassed the Boccadifalco section altogether and rejoined the trail up higher. I eventually found the actual dirt entrance to the TET a couple kilometers east of the village of San Martino (above).

The first 5 minutes of TET lead through a wooded park-like area, a perfect 10 on the easy scale.

A little later, the trail starts climbing up the mountain in long zigzags eventually reaching a ridge overlooking the next valley. It’s not a hard climb, but occasional wash outs and loose-rock surface keep you relatively focused.

Once on the ridge, seemingly endless riding opportunities await. The trail splits three or even four ways and the valley below unveils even more dirt trails scaling the surrounding hills.

As I soon found out, however, this is a conditional promise.

Having taken 45 min to explore all the paths, I found two of them blocked by suspiciously fallen trees and one dead ending on a high mountain farm. The fourth lead down into the valley below and away from TET. Could I hop one of the trees? Probably, but this would not do. Not with two fully loaded bikes and possibly dozens of these situation ahead trying to go between Palermo and Catania in a single day. My new Metzeler Karoo 4s felt pretty confident in the worst of the deep, loose rock visibly torn up by dirt bikes the weekend before, but I ride dirt on my Tenere every day back in Santa Fe. Min does not.

360 Video of the ascent to the ridge.

Conclusion, the TET here is best enjoyed by locals on lighter bikes. Skilled long-haul riders with lots of time would probably do fine, but practice your tree hoping and 360 wheelies first.

Esterna Valle Cuba

After much time wasted on Wikiloc where nearly all promising trails proved to be either illegal ventures into hiking-only territory or simply blocked off by private gates, I threw in the towel and simply started looking at satellite data on Google and Google Earth. Eventually, this lead me to an area just north of Monreale where I spied a stretch of tarmac transitioning into dirt then climbing up into the hills. As far as I could tell there was no gate in the way. Wikiloc showed no recorded gpx trails in the area, but I decided to take the 45 minute ride to find out anyway.

I was well rewarded for my efforts. The first sign I was on the right track was a lone dirt bike rider I passed some 100 yards before the very narrow tarmac lane labelled Esterna Valle Cuba turned into rock, gravel and sand. From there, the trails continues up a green valley paralleling a stream flowing below. The trail surface itself has all the signs of being well travelled by knobbies – rubber spun ditches preceding rocky steps, tire marks in the sand, displaced smaller rocks. As on the first section of the Sicilian TET, the trail goes from easy to not easily ignored but never difficult. About the only challenge, once again, are the fallen trees. Most can be ducked under with mirrors fully folded, others have to be ridden around.

Eventually, I ended up all alone in an empty valley with a half dozen trails leading out. There were clear signs of smaller, make-shift dirt bike playgrounds everywhere. I explored a couple of them encountering more fallen trees, but I was perfectly happy with the finding. If I were to live in Palermo, a house within a 20 minute commute of this area would keep my Tenere nicely soiled every day of the week. Sure enough, on my way back down I ran into a group of five dirt bikes on their way to afternoon fun.

Tree crossings.

Goat Gates

This is a gray area I did not have the time to fully explore. On one of our earlier Sicani rides, we came across stick and wire gates not unlike those found in New Mexico. Back home, these are often on private land, but can be crossed as long as you close them behind you. They are mostly there to keep the cow herds from wondering around. It seems like here they would serve a similar purpose, but being a guest in a foreign land I did not want to presume. Looking beyond the gate, the trails looked like they were in daily if infrequent use and, while narrow, wouldn’t pose a challenge to a small car.