Not only is Vulcano home to Vulcan, God of Fire, but its crater was also considered the entrance to Hell by many (including Dante) during the Middle Ages. Today Vulcano is a rather quiet place outside of May-September; come in April to witness the beginning of spring and enjoy relative peace. Few take time to explore beyond the crater, many visiting Vulcano only as a day trip from the mainland or Lipari. The island is easily accessible, being the closest Eolie to mainland Sicily. Ferryboats leave Milazzo regularly for Vulcano, taking only half an hour on the speedy aliscafo (hydrofoil). One can see the crater's smoke, even smell the sulfur upon arrival as the port lies directly below the crater.

Not as large or populous as neighboring Lipari, Vulcano has no great developments, no large hotels, but instead a number of smaller hotels and room rentals. Its main port village, Vulcano, is small but cozy, and there are several fine outdoor cafés. One may rent a room from a multitude of places, call the tourist office for more information (090-9852028, open in summer only). For hotels, try the Hotel Orsa Maggiore, set back from the port but is close to the black sand beach (090-9852018), or the Hotel Les Sables Noirs, which is also an excellent restaurant (090-9850). Another restaurant worth trying is Al Porticciolo (090-9852567).

Walking up to the crater is fairly easy and straightforward: follow the main road out of town, where there is a signed trail to the crater. After a moderate, switch-backing ascent of an hour-and-a-half, the wide crater rim is reached. Fascinating are the bright yellow pure sulfur deposits above the hissing fissures. Walk the panoramic rim around the crater, from where views extend over all of the Eolie and back to Sicily. Be sure to return on the same route you came up on: there are trail markers on the far side of the rim but this trail is no longer feasible.

There are quite a lot of other areas to explore beyond the crater. Vulcanello or "little Vulcano" rose out of the sea suddenly only two thousand years ago. Eyewitness accounts in 182 B.C. recall the great underwater eruption that created this little peninsula; Roman historian and naturalist Pliny the Elder also writes of the event. There is a fine trail to the top of Vulcanello. There is a fine black sand beach along the isthmus between Vulcano and Vulcanello; nearby there is a bubbling fumarole, not far from a sulfuric mud pool whose waters were thought to be therapeutic in ancient times. Behind the towering crater, one can bike or hike on country roads along the isolated Vulcano Piano (plain). From the lighthouse at Gelso or Capo Grillo, there are excellent views toward mainland Sicily, reaching as far away as Calabria, the Nebrodi Mountains, perhaps even the outline of Mt. Etna, the highest volcano in Europe at 3330 m.

Evidence that the Fire God still makes his appearance now and then may be seen in the case of the eccentric James Stevenson. In 1876 Stevenson, who came from Glasgow, purchased a villa on Vulcano's port for a mere 5.450 lire (about $3). A large swath of land came with the house, extending from the main port all the way up to the active crater. Stevenson proceeded to develop his home, treat his land and his neighbors as if he had never left his native isle. He enforced strict Anglo-Saxon land laws even though these were most foreign to Vulcano, closed his port to fishermen, had his house and land guarded by ferocious dogs, forced workers to mine sulfur from the crater vents, and planted the Union Jack at the summit of Vulcanello. The God Stevenson had replaced the God of Fire, but fortunately for the natives Vulcan would not stand long stand for it. Stevenson's peculiar world was shaken up during the volatile years of 1888-90, when the island recorded a series of violent explosions. Once a bus-size boulder was sent in Stevenson's direction. After this experience the now not-so-hardy Scot decided that his homeland wasn't so dreary after all, and more or less escaped town on the first boat. His house was sold to a local resident, the extravagant domain returned (after a lawsuit) to island citizens.