Sicily's Historic Trains Return in October, With Three Baroque Line Dates
A 2026 season of twelve vintage-train circulations runs to 20 December, with the Siracusa–Modica Baroque route listed for three autumn dates, according to partial Sicilian press reports.
The season is scheduled to open on 11 October with a vintage train on the Palermo–Roccapalumba itinerary, followed on 18 October by a run between Messina and Santo Stefano di Camastra, according to Ragusa News. The same report sets out a 2026 programme of twelve circulations running until 20 December, with departures from Palermo, Messina, Catania, Siracusa and Caltanissetta. Radio RTM, datelined Palermo on 2 October, gives the same opening date and refers to passengers travelling aboard authentic period carriages.
At the centre of the programme is the Baroque route. Ragusa Oggi, writing on 1 October, calls it the Ferrovia del Barocco, a historic itinerary crossing the island's south-east, and places it within a season of vintage trains promoted by the Regione Siciliana together with Fondazione FS Italiane and FS Treni Turistici Italiani. Ragusa News names the promoting body as the Assessorato del Turismo, Sport e Spettacolo della Regione Siciliana, alongside the same two partners. Each formulation is attributed to the outlet that used it; neither report states whether the two designations refer to the same office.
Ragusa News lists the Baroque route between Siracusa and Modica with travel dates of 31 October, 1 November and 8 December. Radio RTM calls it the Treno del Barocco and describes dedicated connections between the same two cities, without giving dates for them. Ragusa Oggi says three appointments were already scheduled on the route, but its text breaks off before the dates appear.
The itineraries are not only about the carriages. Radio RTM describes the Baroque connection as crossing the Val di Noto, allowing travellers to see architectural works and rural views, with landscapes that change colour in the autumn light. It frames the experience as slow mobility, a way of rediscovering the territory by rail.
All three accounts are partial. Ragusa News breaks off at an entry for 25 October, leaving that leg's destination unstated in the visible text, and the other two reports end mid-passage, so the full list of appointments and the details of individual services cannot be checked against them. What remains legible is the image the sources return to: period carriages, running through the south-east of Sicily, on a line whose name the reports do not agree on.