Pantelleria: dammusi and dormant volcanoes

Closer to Tunisia than Sicily, Pantelleria preserves unique lava-stone architecture found nowhere else in Italy and a thermal lake born inside an ancient crater.

A rental car or scooter remains necessary to tour the island.

Low, rounded, with thick walls that isolate from summer heat: the dammusi, traditional dwellings built from volcanic stone, still dot the island's countryside today.

Inside an ancient crater, Lake of Venus mixes warm thermal waters with mud used for centuries for natural beauty treatments.

Climbing inland you reach Montagna Grande, an extinct volcano that at 836 meters dominates the entire island, often shrouded in sudden mists.

Toward evening, the Elephant Arch, a natural rock formation shaped like a trunk dipping into the sea, closes the day on one of the island's most photographed coastlines, especially at sunset.

The dry stone walls and dammusi dwellings of Pantelleria, along with the terraced cultivation of zibibbo grapes, have been recognized by UNESCO as an agricultural heritage site and living traditional practice.

Lake Venere takes its name from the goddess to whom local legend attributes the regenerative properties of its hot waters and the mud deposits along the shores.