I was a little worn out after the South of France wedding events...and after missing two flights just to get to Nice, and then leaving Nice a day late and uncertain if we would make the train to Cinque Terre, I almost ruled it out and went straight to Tuscany. Remember, we didn't plan a
thing, so it wasn't like we had hotels to cancel... It's a good thing we made that train and didn't skip what has become another one of my most favorite places in the world. There were other trains too...I had just lost some "travel patience" at that point, and my feet hurt after all that dancing in the cryptic abbey...so it wasn't like that was our only chance to get to Cinque Terre...
Here is a map of the towns:
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| Map of Cinque Terre |
The train from Nice to Cinque Terre only took a few hours. Don't ever eat on a train. I had forgotten that from my last Europe trip... It's like a sin to eat that terrible food when the best Caprese in the world is just beyond the train tracks. We arrived in Cinque Terre, one of the most visited places in the world, with nowhere to stay. That's one thing I wish we had planned for. We had hoped (and read online) that the first station in Cinque Terre (Monterrosso al Mare) would have lockers where you could store your luggage, so we thought we'd do that and then trek around looking for a great place to call home for a couple days. Not the case. Monterosso al Mare has a "Tourism" office right by the train station, and they always keep track of what hotels have room. Luckily we found something. I was a little scared of it at first (this shady looking Italian guy walks us out the building where the front desk was, around the corner, and down the street to another building that was too dark for me, and we proceed up 3 flights of stairs and past another shady looking Italian guy who is sweating and has a tank top on...so that wasn't a good start), but once we got down another hallway and into our room, and we opened the hurricane shutters, I saw that it was clean, could sleep up to 4 people, and had a great balcony with views of the mountains and the ocean. And, since it was the only place available & I didn't feel like schlepping luggage up and down the hills of Cinque Terre (if you go there you'll know what I mean), we took it. Later we did torture ourselves in the other towns by asking if they had available rooms (which they did & I would have been willing to pay for a really nice place), but I didn't want to waste time on switching places.
We spent that first afternoon walking (or climbing, rather) around Monterrosso. We walked by a restaurant called L'Ancora della Tortuga and saw that they didn't have many tables & it was perched high up, overlooking the Med. We asked the girl working if we could get a table for that night. She went through the reservations, and we snagged one of two available tables that evening & said we'd be back at 9pm. Lucky us! See, you don't always have to have plans... This was the best food I think we ate in Italy (and that's saying a lot because the food is amazing everywhere). I wish I had photos of our dinners to show you here. We ate a plate of raw seafood, with lobster, salmon, and other fish with only olive oil and lemon. We also ordered a pasta that I wish I could re-create but I know I'll never be able to, and of course a bottle of red wine. Here are a couple photos of the restaurant I found online, just to show you the setting & why we were lucky to get a table!
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| View of the patio from above... |
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| View from above (& it's steep below too). |
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| The servers come up to the patio from the restaurant below. |
The hiking, the air temperature, getting in the ocean, the food, the wine, the views....I don't know how you could beat this place unless there were waves... I want to spend a few months here at some point in our lives.
The next day we did the full Cinque Terre excursion....We went to all the towns & we ate in every town! We took the train to Riomaggiore, which is the farthest town, and spent the day working our way back to Monterrosso. I won't go into detail on every single town, but I will say that Vernazza was my favorite town. Riomaggiore and Corniglia probably came in 2nd, but they were all fantastic. Normally I watch what I eat...blah blah....but in Cinque Terre (and Italy in general), my only goal was to eat as much as I could. The food is THAT good. We kept saying that God must have kissed this area, because the tomatoes are so juicy and tasty, the olive oil is exceptional, the wine won't give you a hangover (so drink as much as you'd like!), the seafood is so good, and it's like everything has 10x the flavor that it does at home (and we eat well in Santa Barbara...). I read a woman's blog that said,
"You haven't lived until you've had pesto in the Cinque Terre" and now I agree with her. If you hike the trails, you will see all the grape vines and the olive trees. In town, you will see all the little gardens & how well they use their space. They have built gardens that grow horizontally, vertically, and every which way.
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| This is where we ate in Riomaggiore. |
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| Looking back & down on the restaurant where we ate next to the bluffs...Riomaggiore. |
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| There is great art in these towns, both in the shops and as you walk through town... |
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| Walking by a mural...in Riomaggiore |
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| Riomaggiore |
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| Riomaggiore |
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| The hike between Riomaggiore & Manarola. Also called Via Dell'Amore (or roughly "Lovers Walk"). |
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| Manarola |
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| Manarola |
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| Manarola |
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| Manarola |
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| A church in Manarola |
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| A church in Manarola |
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| It's hard to describe how blue & clear the Med is.... |
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| Views everwhere... |
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| The streets of Manarola |
In Manarola, we found this amazing restaurant up a somewhat hidden lane called Trattoria dal Billy. If you visit this town, you have to eat there! We found it on our own, but it turns out that TripAdvisor and Rick Steves have recommended it. We ordered a seafood appetizer, and they brought 12 different types of seafood in their own little dishes to our table. I did get pics this time...
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| Steep stairs...it's 3 flights down to the patio. |
Next we were off to Corniglia...It's very steep when you arrive in this town. You have to climb about 400 steps to get up to the town. Because it's so steep, it's hard to photograph, so we took pics of it as we hiked out to Vernazza.
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| Church in Corniglia |
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| Church in Corneglia |
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| Looking back on Corniglia |
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| Getting further out from Corniglia...on our hike to Vernazza. |
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| The trail has a lot of steps & it's pretty steep. A lot of ups and downs.... |
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| Don't forget to jump in! |
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| A classic looking elderly Italian couple |
Then Vernazza (our favorite)...We arrived around sunset & we raced across town because I wanted to get some photos before sunset. We could see Vernazza from Monterrosso, so we knew the sun hits the little town at the perfect angle around sunset, and we wanted to end our ventures here & have dinner at sunset. We timed it perfectly!
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| Vernazza |
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| At dinner in Vernazza |
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| At dinner. Great restaurant by the water: Gambero Rosso. |
And last, we took the train back to Monterrosso al Mare to crash & get up early to head to Tuscany...
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| We ended back in Monterrosso al Mare |
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| Monterrosso al Mare |
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