Irene’s apartment is beautiful, with a great view of the peak of Mt Etna (if it’s not cloudy!). This was by far the nicest most modern place we stayed our entire trip in Sicily. What made the stay even nicer was that Irene offers a menu of wines, Modica chocolate and meat/cheese boards which she prepares with local Zaffarena honey.
Zaffarena seems lovely with an unexpected (to me bc we didn’t research) food and wine culture including a Michelin star restaurant 3 buildings away from the apartment and a month long harvest festival in October every Sunday with stalls set up in the downtown to taste foods. I’m sorry we were passing through on a Wednesday in October and not s Sunday, but we did eat lots of porcini mushrooms at our dinner that night.
Parking was plentiful outside the apartment right on the street. Only caution is that Zaffarena is located up a little bit on a mountain base so there are some small winding roads and inclines to navigate, which may be ‘fun’ for someone with a manual rental car like us.
Would definitely recommend staying at Irene’s place if you’re looking for a Mt Etna home base or enjoying to local foods :)