Furnari – Festivity of Our Lady of Trapani
Set in the middle of the gulf between Capo Tindari and Capo Milazzo, Furnari is a hilly town that has discovered its recent vocation in the sea. On the hill there is the Mother Church, built in 1600 on the ruins of the castle of Furnari, guardian of a beautiful wooden Crucifix. Also worth seeing the Church of S. Antonio da Padova, built in 1600, the Church of Jesus and Mary of 1400, the Church of the Madonna del Carmine built in 1547, and finally the Church of Our Lady of Trapani which preserves the original statue of the Madonna of Trapani and valuable wooden statues. After visiting the historical part of the town, you move on the coast where there is the hamlet of Tonnarella.
From a fishing village, it has now become a tourist destination of great appeal to the blue sea and the fine and golden sandy beach. A stone’s throw from the town of Tonnarella is the tourist port of Portorosa, that with moorings for 680 sailboats and motor boats up to 30 meters in length and its village consisting of 600 housing units, is a point of reference for cruisers in the low Tyrrhenian Sea. The favorable geographic position places it as an obligatory stop along the routes to the Egadi, Aeolian Islands and Ustica Island.
In the hamlet of Tonnarella, on the second Sunday in August, the Festival of Our Lady of Trapani, that over the years has become an attraction for thousands of people coming from nearby countries because, in addition to the procession through the streets of the town, The statue of Our Lady is brought to the sea by the fishermen’s boats in a suggestive as extraordinary procession which begins at sunset and from Tonnarella it is up to neighboring countries. When it comes back, the statue is picked on the beach by stupendous torches.