We start walking on the third day, the easiest section of the whole trekking: 20 km with a regular ascending path until mount Palestro, walking over the "altomontana" track.
We leave the refuge to keep walking on the track . The landscape changes continuosly, showing woods and magma desert on the same area. Close to mount Scavo refuge we see an old lava flow that created huge "dagale" (green spots surrounded by lava), then we reach mount Nunziata cave , reserved to equipped speleologists. We also find some unexpected birch trees , I thought they were only in the Sartorius mounts area.
We quickly go beyond mount Palestro refuge and Galvarina refuge , then we look for the last time at the magma desert before we go inside the pine tree wood , really close to our goal: San Giovanni Gualberto refuge , a building usually not available to hikers that forest rangers kindly opened for us.
The path was really easy, compared to the first two days. We can have some rest before the final ascending to mount Etna central craters.
Difficulty: high
Difference in height: 750 m
Maximum height: 1980 m
Length: 20 km
Duration of journey: 5 - 8 hours
Suggested season: spring
Technical equipment : required