Cinque Terre: Day Two (Riomaggiore, Vernazza, Manarola)

(Sorry this took so long! Real life happened. My bad.)

So the next morning, we woke up and actually saw what the town looked like. And, big surprise, it was adorable.

We ate a light breakfast at the hostel before checking out and catching a bus all the way down the mountain to the first of the Cinque Terre towns, Riomaggiore. The drive was much less terrifying in daylight, and we got some great views of the ocean as the bus wound around cliffsides on the way down.

We were surprised that the bus didn't stop at the edge of the town, but nosed its way right down the crowded, steep, and narrow main street. We thought for sure the bus driver was going to start mowing down pedestrian tourists any second, but no one got ran over and we got to dive right into the town's festive, bustling atmosphere. Upon alighting, one of the first things we found was this amazing mosaic wall of painted tiles.

All of the Cinque Terre towns are quite small, so it only took a minute or two of walking to find the water. Boy, the weather was flawless. We seriously lucked out.

May I present to you my lovely travel companions!

We climbed a long, skinny staircase clinging to the side of the cliff and ended up on a little terrace overlooking the candy-colored houses and the boat ramp down below. (Check out that monster aloe vera plant in the foreground there.)

After we'd taken a fair amount of pictures, we walked through a tunnel to the train station and hopped a (very crowded) train to the next town, Vernazza.

The primary feature of Vernazza was definitely the rocky protrusion overlooking the ferry dock, where we sat enjoying the day without even making conversation for quite some time.

This seagull was highly unamused by having his photograph taken.

My friend Niles took this picture and was kind enough to send it to me. I love what he did with the colors.

photograph by Niles George

After maybe half an hour of watching the ferry come and go and creeping on the seagulls, we decided it was lunchtime and reluctantly descended from our cliffside perch in search of panini. Which we found. And also some gelato. After we'd sated our hunger somewhat, we explored some of the little back streets between the houses farther up the hill. There was a lot of salmon pink. Apparently that's the favored color in Vernazza.

We wandered back up to the train station and hung out waiting for the train (we spent a fair portion of our day waiting for trains, but that's all right, the weather was great so it was fine). Eventually, we made it onto a train to the only town we had left to visit, Manarola.

I would say that Manarola was easily the most picturesque of the towns, especially from the clifftop path that we started hiking. We gave up pretty quickly on account of the heat and how inviting the water looked, but we all agreed that swimming instead of hiking was a legitimate life choice.

We did take the time for many photos before retracing our path down to the swimming area though.

photograph by Niles George

Changing out of our clothes into our swimsuits was an adventure, since there were no changing rooms, but we managed it with minimal flashing (I think) and had a refreshing swim in the mermaid-worthy lagoon. Niles opted out of the actual swimming, which worked out nicely for the rest of us because that way he could watch all our stuff and also take our picture. Thanks, Niles!

photograph by Niles George

photograph by Niles George

The water was cold at first, but after a few minutes of submersion, it felt amazing. Unfortunately, there were jellyfish here as well, and one of our party got stung, but not badly.

We hung out there for a good chunk of the afternoon until it was finally time to catch the train back to La Spezia, which we did with some reluctance. It was super crowded again, so I was squashed against a door in the vestibule for most of the ride, but it was fine because I got to watch out the window as the ocean flashed by outside. We made it back to La Spezia and boarded our train back to Florence on time, but for some reason it was going twice as slow as we thought it was supposed to and we were a bit late for dinner. But we did in fact make it back safely, yay!

So that was Cinque Terre. I totally recommend it for anyone traveling in the area. Would love to go back someday, maybe take a stab at the hiking trails.

In the meantime, I'd better get to work on a Venice post, before I forget everything! I leave you with a last farewell from the Manarola lagoon. Bye!

- Kasha

Cinque Terre: Day One (Monterosso)

Last weekend was busy, but excellent.

On Friday night, Andrea took my roommates and I to our oldest host brother Simone's apartment for dinner and a movie. We had these marvelous exploding cheeses that you put on top of grilled vegetables and then pop the skin so hot cheese goes everywhere. The movie we saw was called La Leggenda del Pianista sull' Oceano (The Legend of the Pianist on the Ocean) and it told the story of an orphan boy who lived his entire life on a cruise ship in the earliest years of the 18th century. At a very young age, he discovered an extraordinary, almost supernatural talent for playing the piano. People kept insisting that he leave the ship and go on tour, but he never wanted to set foot on land as long as he lived, claiming that he could only make music while on the ocean. It was a beautiful story with a bittersweet ending that had me bawling all over the place, much to everyone's amusement. So that was a good time.

And then early Saturday morning, I boarded a train with three other people for Cinque Terre! And wow, it was magical. If any of you have a Pinterest, you have probably seen, at some time or other, photographs of this improbably beautiful section of the Italian coast.

After a few hours on the train, we arrived in La Spezia, a bit further inland than Cinque Terre proper, and took another short train to the furthest of the five towns, Monterosso.

The first thing we did after disembarking the train was hop straight on down to the beach, conveniently located directly below the train station. Look at that water.

The beach itself was crowded and pebbly and there were a few too many jellyfish for comfort and the water was whoa freezing, but we enjoyed ourselves anyway and I collected some pretty pebbles because I am a five-year-old.

After we'd gotten as dry and un-sandy as possible (which wasn't very, but whatever), we hiked uphill through the town.

... saw some magnificent views...

... and found a cemetery on the hilltop.

Which had a spectacular view of its own.

After exploring Monterosso to our satisfaction, we took the train back one stop to Corniglia, but when we got off at the station and looked up, we realized that the actual town was very, very high on the cliff and the only way we could see to get there was a very, very steep path. One member of our party was wearing Birkenstocks and none of us were feeling up to the climb, so we bailed out and sat around the train station playing Would You Rather for about two hours until the next train to La Spezia came through. Which was full. Like, packed. Two of our party made it aboard (barely) but I and another girl did not, so we settled in to wait for another two hours... and the next train came five minutes later. Luckily, we all found each other again in the La Spezia station, where we waited for another couple of hours for the bus that was supposed to take us to the hostel before giving up and hailing a taxi. (Apparently there was indeed a bus somewhere, but we sure couldn't find it.)

The hostel was up in a teeny little mountainside village above La Spezia, and the taxi did a lot of whipping around tight hairpin curves and going unnecessarily fast on narrow unpaved roads. It was quite the adventure. And then the only restaurant within walking distance of the hostel was full, so we ended up eating a mediocre dinner in the hostel's little upstairs snack bar at like 10pm. We were all so hungry at that point, we didn't really care what we were eating, so it was fine. And the room itself was clean and nice, with a super high ceiling so it didn't even feel that small. 10/10, would stay again, but would recommend eating in the city before taking the bus up the hill.

I took this picture of La Spezia as we were walking to the restaurant.

I'm going to stop here for now and do Day Two as a separate post, because I took a whole bunch more pictures.

Ciao, ragazzi!

- Kasha