New One-Day Sampler Walking Tours and Cooking Tours in the Dolomites and Sicily, Italy

Ragusa, Sicily, Italy (PRWEB) May 14, 2009 -- New one day walking tours (http://www.italian-connection.com/destinations/custom_tours.html) and cooking tours in Sicily and the Dolomites (Italian Alps) are now offered by Italian Connection (http://www.italian-connection.com/) for travelers looking for a different Italian experience with a minimum commitment of time and money. The cooking tours (http://www.italian-connection.com/destinations/1_day_tours.html) and walking tours are ideal as an "add on" to any itinerary. The one-day cooking tours and walking tours include a Foraging Walk in the Sicilian countryside, a Baroque Walk in the city of Ragusa, Cooking at Home in Sicily, and seasonal Wildflower Walks in the Dolomites and Sicily. The cooking and walking tours in Sicily and Dolomites are for as few as two people and not more than eight participants. Starting at $225 per person for a private two person tour, with discounts for children and larger groups, the cooking tours and walking tours include select meals; excellent wines; unique insider experiences, such as sampling the best cannoli, traipsing through a canyon of secret gardens and perfecting the art of focaccia-making; and walks of three to eight miles tailored to individual fitness levels. For more information and reservations for the cooking tours and walking tours, call 1-800-462-7911 or visit www.italian-connection.com.

In Sicily, the one-day Foraging Walk includes trekking along old mule tracks and over limestone terraces where wild asparagus, mustard tops, capers and chard make the freshest ingredients for the day's lunch. During the Cook at Home in Sicily tour, Italian Connection insiders and Italian cooking experts instruct on the art of making focaccia and pasta dishes using local products such as ricotta, fresh produce and locally grown hard wheat flour. Travelers looking to learn about the culture and history of Ragusa can see amazing Baroque monuments, walk through the fashionable district and secret gardens and eat the best cannoli in Sicily. Wildflower Walks feature vanilla orchids, bright blue gentians and yellow alpine poppies in the Dolomites or wild roses, saffron crocus and fragrant lavender in Sicily.

Italian Connection is an Italy-based tour operator whose top local guides take you behind the scene on hand-crafted walking tours, cooking tours and cultural tours in seven different regions of Italy. Small groups of participants cook alongside noted cookbook author Eleonora Consoli in her home kitchen, meet celebrated chef Ciccio Sultano in Sicily and dine at his 2-star Michelin restaurant "Il Duomo," make bread from the hard wheat flour grown on tiny organic farms, pick wild herbs and plants that flavor the day's lunch, and make hand-rolled pasta in La Maremma where some villagers never heard of their neighbor George Clooney. Visitors meet colorful personalities including an authority on Alpine wildflowers, the owner of Italy's only Cashmere goat farm and a village woman who blazes walking trails on an island with no roads. Twenty-nine land-only tours are offered through the year, including the Splendors of Sicily, named by National Geographic Traveler as one of its 2006 "50 Tours of a Lifetime." Four walking levels range from "stroll" to "fitness" which can burn up to 1,500 calories a day! Private custom cooking tours and walking tours for honeymooners, incentive groups, and flashpackers can also be arranged.

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