* Photos: © Peter Ulrich,
https://fotografie.peterulrich.net/

Sunrise, six o'clock one morning. After a dreamless night, I see the daylight, still a little shy, awakening through the door to the terrace at the end of the kitchen. My eyes are tired, still sleepy, but my mind is unusually alert,
I cheerfully say Hello, sun!, and immediately get up, bare feet on cold stone. I throw on a cardigan and curiously enter the twilight. Oh, what a pleasure this terrace gives me, it is truly a jewel – impressive in its size at eight-by-eight metres and with a 180-degree view over the icy blue sea, it invites you to take a seat and witness a natural spectacle that begins anew every day. The celestial figure is not yet visible, but its radiance is already colouring the firmament with a yellowish shimmer. The play of colours changes. Like a flip-book in my hand, yellow and red now become orange, and wispy clouds mime tongues of fire, which the next moment are swallowed up by the ether, and purple shading into blue. Finally, it appears, with a drum roll in the background, at first timidly, then taking on its spherical form. The sun, its majesty, all our lives are in its hands and, as nonchalantly as every day, it shines on the fleeting band of clouds, and I shine as well, thinking of nothing at this moment, only of how beautiful life is and where the world ends when the horizon disappears into the water. A little later you wake up too and I excitedly tell you about my fabulous start to the day, but first: "Good morning, did you sleep well?"

A few days ago, we arrived on the Italian island of Lipari 24 hours late, somewhat exhausted but safe and sound. Travelling by train was an adventure at times.[1] Due to delays in travelling time, we briefly lost the coordinates of our once finely woven travel plans and were stranded for a night in Verona in northern Italy. Sleepless, but unexpectedly enchanting. Enchanting too: the endless moments and views through the same windowpane format, first rectangular to the mountains, later rectangular to the sea. For us, there was much more to these hours than overcoming space of more than 2,000 kilometres. For us, there was an entire universe.

Lipari is the largest of the Aeolian Islands[2], located in the Tyrrhenian Sea north of Sicily. The family has seven siblings, all volcanic origin, their names: Filicudi, Panarea, Salina, Lipari, Alicudi, Vulcano and Stromboli. The oldest island, Filicudi, was successively formed from lava rock a million years ago. Stromboli is the youngest link in the volcanic chain between Vesuvius and Etna, was formed around 40,000 years ago and has always been the "beacon of the Mediterranean"[3], still active today and therefore unique in Europe. In addition to the geology, the history is also eventful.[4] Evidence of human life can be dated back to the 6th millennium before our time. Thanks to the rich obsidian deposits, the islanders lived comfortably here, and trade flourished. The hard, glass-like volcanic rock was used to make tools and weapons long before metals such as copper became commercially important. With the end of the demand for rock glass, the economic power died out and centuries of insignificance followed but changing occupations. By the Ausons, the Greeks, the Carthaginians, the Romans. By the Arabs, the Normans, the Ottomans.
A pawn of the great powers. In addition, piracy, and slavery, and later a place of exile for political prisoners under Mussolini's fascism at the beginning of the 20th century. Finally, in 1949, a film heralded the turnaround and today's tourist significance: "Stromboli" by Roberto Rossellini with Ingrid Bergmann in the leading role.

Initially, you and I didn't want to go on a classic tourist holiday, but rather dress up as digital nomads for a while and see if this role suited us. Moderate success. After all, how could I, for example, concentrate fully on German bureaucracy while the music of the sweet life with all its temptations is playing here? Holiday versus everyday life –
a parallel without an intersection, and I am unable to create one. After a few days of paid work, I pack up my laptop, lie down in the hammock after work and let my gaze wander for kilometres across the sea to the horizon and beyond. Head off. An hour later, enough dozing. So, let's set off to discover the volcanic islands.

Ciao, Lipari!

We start the day completely relaxed, with two espressos for breakfast and a selection of delicacies from the local convenience store: Pecorino, olives, fresh fruit, and panini with pesto eoliano, whose special ingredient is capers[5], plus three slices of cucumber as a topping, delicious. There's no avoiding it, we munch and crumble with relish, and at some point, we see a colony of ants busily trying to carry away our breadcrumbs. A tricky undertaking, as their luggage is three times bigger than their little insect bodies and it obviously takes a lot of ambition and perseverance. In the end, team spirit is the key to success, so enjoy yourselves. Here comes Bahia, our pet dog, scampering round the corner and Adreano is busy climbing the stone wall of our house on a thousand feet. Good morning, you rascals! But now we want to get going, andiamo, and off we go on our hike, with our first stop at the jasmine bush around the corner. The scent is so wonderful in the morning dew, we just can't get enough of it. A second stop and inspection of the omnipresent opuntia. The fleshy-leaved cactus plant with juicy, delicious purple and orange prickly pear fruits grows everywhere on Lipari on mountain slopes and in valley gorges. We pick up a few of them, oh dear, and our fingers are immediately covered in thousands of micro-spines. But this annoyance doesn't stop us from dreaming ourselves into one of the many empty properties and building up a prickly pear empire. Soap, jam, spirit.

We continue our journey on foot along a narrow stone road high up along the coast. Occasionally a Vespa passes by with German couples in their thirties, who are remarkably over-represented. Otherwise, just solitude. Now it's lunchtime and the thermometer read 25 degrees. I can't believe this temperature and sorely miss my baseball cap, which is still lying around in Berlin and is probably freezing, while my scalp is sizzling in the sunshine here.
Not a single tree can provide shade. After four hours downhill and uphill, we reach a height with a kaolin quarry. Porcelain clay was once mined here. Today the place is abandoned, but the volcanic rock is colourfully layered in variations of yellow, red, and black. An imaginary smell of sulphur hangs lazily in the air.

In the evening, we manage to motivate ourselves to go to the town festival at the harbour despite our physical aches and pains. It's a goodbye to the summer season and we've seen adverts for it everywhere. The atmosphere is exuberant, we grab a drink and join the locals, who dance merrily late into the night. Our return march to the centre of the island is a martyrdom. The first ascent is impressive with a gradient of 27 per cent and religious sculptures along the way. Every walk becomes a hike, every hike a challenge. At least for me. I'm sweating and panting but giving up is not an option. Not anyway. A short stop on a broken wall, then we walk on, three and a half kilometres through the barely lit darkness. The barking of dogs accompanies us on our way.

Bongiorno, Vulcano!

We take the maritime public transport to the neighbouring island of Vulcano in a quarter of an hour without any complications. Welcomed by the pungent smell of sulphur and an apocalyptic atmosphere with a few empty tourist shops, we leave these on our right and immediately set off on a short walk towards the Gran Cratere. A well-intentioned warning sign at the entrance prohibits the ascent at lunchtime. The sun is at its zenith, and we set off along black sandy paths and yellow rocky gorges that meander like dried-up river formations. At an altitude of
300 metres, we reach the crater rim, the crater rim of a volcano – and walk on joyfully as if nothing is wrong.
But watch out, it is bubbling and steaming from numerous fumaroles, the gases are burning, the earth is alive.
And then there is the view of the vast sea, with the island sisters in the background. The scenery is dreamlike, and there are only a few people who circle the crater completely, look into its abyss and recognise a heart in its maw.
A surreal world. In contrast, we encounter a crowd of people back on Start, which is supposedly very real. The island with its lava sand beaches and mud pools is occupied, a playground for holidaymakers strutting through the streets in their swimwear, Why?, and by day visitors like us. As a result, life is twice as unreal.

Salve, Stromboli!

Somewhat uneasily, we book a tourist tour at one of the many travel agencies that line the harbour in Lipari town. The offer is unbeatable, and its content cannot be realised on our own, because we want to see the volcano and its live show at night. Finally, the salesman encourages us with a smile and assures us: "The natural spectacle is almost guaranteed! Stromboli has been continuously active[6] for over 2,000 years and usually spews lava and ash from its vents several times an hour." With this promise, we board the excursion boat and settle in. Seated at the top, the wind in our hair, the sea glistening in front of us. It is 1 pm.

The tour includes a one-hour stopover on Panarea. We refuse to join the queues of people and stay at the harbour instead. We quickly buy a cold lemonade in orange and pomegranate flavours and set up our chess set on the quay wall. It's my turn, it's going pretty well and time flies by. Then we take off, because our destination is Stromboli.
The three-quarter hour crossing is accompanied by a truly beautiful human voice that tells stories from the sea in Italian, English and German. For example, that the volcano can be seen over 900 metres above the surface of the water, with a further 2,000 metres hidden below. By now we are quite enchanted by our trip, the microphone is crackling.

There it is, the lovely beast! A cloud of ash over its head, and immediately the cameras are pulled out in droves.
Click, click. After a short visit to the island, which turns out to be surprisingly pretty, we set off again before sunset, circle anti-clockwise and stop in front of the Sciara del Fuoco, the so-called fire slide. Let the show begin! We wait, awestruck and a little tense. Because a cloud has positioned itself in front of the craters with us, albeit beautifully shaped, it now blocks the view. Nevertheless, once, or twice we see the beginnings of a glowing red fountain.
The excitement is simmering towards boiling point. A while later, a little lava, first glowing, then solidified into stone, leaps laughing into the darkness. A murmur, ohh... The stone has already sunk into the sea. Silence under a starry sky. We wait and wait and wait, and at some point – we give up. No chance tonight, the boat turns round, but it doesn't matter. The seats on the upper deck are emptying now, you also disappear, but you return after a few minutes and surprise me with a beer, marvellous. I lie back on a bench and think: somehow, I like that the volcano didn't spit, that it didn't stage itself, that it wasn't interested, that it wasn't impressed – by us. We are nothing, and just human hubris is unable to realise that it is not us who have the last word, but the wonders of nature. The night is black, and under billions of stars I meet Cassiopeia again and I am grateful for the reunion. Our journey across the Mediterranean is peaceful, I think: it is for us.

Sunset, six o'clock one evening. We climb the stone wall at our favourite vantage point over the sea, where we swam one last time today. Behind the boulders, the beach was empty and pebbly, the water clear and undulating. I took my snorkelling set, which I had bought last year in Sardinia, and once again entered a magical underwater world:
I let myself drift, gently accompanied by the waves of the water, the sun warming my skin and at the same time drawing bright hexagons on the seabed. A few fish swim by me, then a hundred of them in shoals. You beauties.
How quiet it is in your world, the silence is overwhelming. I am a fish, just like you. Now we sit here and wait for the sun to set. We bought one last Sicilian beer in a shop shed: A table with a tarpaulin, a fridge and a woman who kept my sunglasses, which I thought were lost, for me on the very first day. Since then, we've been friends of the heart. One last time, the rugged rocks coloured red-orange and purple-red. One last time the infinity, the eternal sea, metallic blue and grey, and without transition to the sky, which turns a shimmering pink. A thousand plays of colour. I tell you about my dreams, that I would love to be a watercolour painter. With shining eyes, I can see the pictures that I paint on an easel in a wide corridor – how elegantly the colours flow into each other, limitless. The world is limitless here as well.

Interesting!

In Lipari town, the Museo Archeologico Eoliano is located on the fortress hill with numerous valuable exhibits from the history of the Aeolian Islands: vases, weapons, jewellery and a collection of theatre masks and statuettes that is unique in the world. Around 1,500 examples from the 4th and 3rd centuries BCE were found as grave goods during excavations of Greek necropolises. These terracottas depict characters from comedies and tragedies by Sophocles, Aristophanes, and Euripides, among others, some even from plays whose texts are no longer preserved today.
(For documentation purposes, here are two photos from my collection).

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[1] I wrote a short story about the train journey entitled "Lipari – timetable, reloaded" for a writing competition. Result so far open. Publication, one way or another, will follow.

[2] The name Lipari Islands is also used synonymously. Legends tell of the origin of the multiple names: On the one hand, it is Liparos, the king of the Ausons, who settled on the island of Lipari after being expelled from central Italy by his brothers and gave it his name. The other is Aeolus, a favourite of Zeus and ruler of the winds. He lived with his wife Kyane, the daughter of Liparos, on the island of Aeolia, which is also located in this region in real geography and is considered to be the starting point
of Odysseus' wanderings.

[3] Volcano filmmaker and specialised journalist Marc Szeglat offers an easily accessible and extremely interesting introduction to the world of volcanoes on his website (in German): https://www.vulkane.net/.

[4] See also: Schröder, Thomas: Sizilien. Erlangen: Michael Müller Verlag GmbH 2022 (11th completely revised and updated edition), page 390.

[5] In Germany, capers are known primarily and almost exclusively as a sauce ingredient for Königsberger Klopse. It lives
a shadowy existence. Quite wrongly, because the flower bud of the thorny caper bush, preserved in salt, vinegar or oil,
is a delicacy – as an antipasto, in salads, on pizza and pasta.
Further information about the spice and remedy can be found at (in German):
https://www.zentrum-der-gesundheit.de/ernaehrung/lebensmittel/gewuerze/kapern.

[6] The largest eruption in decades last occurred on 3 July 2019: Two explosions and an ash cloud that rose several kilometres into the sky. Chunks of lava, pyroclastic flows, bushfires, panic. The ascent to the summit at 918 metres has been closed ever since. There are two alternative viewpoints to visit: at 400 metres only accessible with a guide, at 290 metres on your own.

*Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version). Made some modifications.