La Spezia & Cinque Terre

We arrived in La Spezia about 2:30 pm and we were all surprised at how big it is. I think we all though it was a small sleepy port village. It’s not, it has quite a large port, large enough to dock cruise ships! It has lots beautiful 5-6 story apartment buildings and I swear that people must be part mountain goat as there are stairs everywhere. This is going to test the legs even more.

Our apartment is another lovely one and though not as spacious as Florence it’s still very good. It’s in a great location being only ten minutes walk from the station and less than five to the main shopping/restaurant area. We tried to get into a restaurant that had really good reviews but they were fully booked. I asked the waitress if she could recommend another place and what she suggested was probably one of the best meals we’ve had in Italy.

We headed off about 9:00am the next morning for Rio Maggiore, the first town in the Cinque Terre National Park. It’s only a 15-minute train from La Spezia. When we got off the train we weren’t quite sure which way we should go so we kind of just followed the crowd until we found somewhere for breakfast.

Rio Maggiore

After breakfast we started following the crowd again but this time it was the wrong crowd and I think they may have been leading us to one of the hiking tracks. We decided to turn back and follow the other crowd and this is more of what we wanted to see. The view up the valley into the hills and also down to the sea were pretty good.

Manarola

Next stop was Manarola. This one was a little easier to navigate and we soon found our way down to the port. It is another bustling village filled with tourists and we only added to the chaos. It was meant to rain most of the day but so far there has been only a little sprinkling of rain and it’s not cold at all. From here we had the option to take a ferry but Rylan and I decided that we would walk from the next town, Corniglia, but the ferry didn’t take us there. The funny thing about these towns, is there is no major attraction at any of them. It’s just about strolling through the streets taking in the atmosphere of the towns and the scenery.

This is about 1/3 the way up the stairs

Next stop is Corniglia which is perched high up on the hill and is a killer to get to. The stairway just kept going up and up and up. I guessing there were about twenty flights of stairs but it felt like a a hundred! I thought it would never end. I have a feeling that I am going to have the sorest legs tomorrow and I’m not looking forward to that.

View from the top

We finally made it to the top and like the other towns we made our way to the main area. This is where we stopped for lunch. Corniglia seemed to be a bit more tourist focused with a lot more shops and cafes. We found a nice little outdoor restaurant in a lovely piazza.

From there, Rylan and I decided we would take the walking trail to the next town. Terry preferred to take the train so we decided to meet him at the other end. At the start Rylan and I both thought that Terry should have come because it looked like the track was going to be inland and not on the edge of a cliff.

That's Corniglia in the background (where we'v come from)

Then we hit the high stuff and some of it didn’t have railings and wasn’t very wide. It was safe though and you come across quite a few people coming from the opposite direction. All our walking and stair climbing must have paid off because I found the track OK. I wouldn't say it was easy but at each point where I thought I’d had enough of climbing up a steep track or climbing more stairs it seemed to level out and I would be fine again. The views were magnificent and again photos cannot do it justice, especially on a hazy day.

Vernazza from the trail

It took us about one and half hours to get to Vernazza and that was with stopping for photos or just taking in the view. I think the hardest bit was coming down into the next town. The uneven steps seemed to take for ever. We found Terry and it seems he had a nice time without us. When Rylan and I got there, we had a quick drink and look around and then decided to move on.

Terry and I decided to take the train to the last town, Monterosso. Rylan had decided to take the walking trail instead of the train and was going to make his own way back the apartment in La Spezia when he finished. It was supposed to take about two hours.

Monterosso beach

Monterosso is a beach side village that is right down on the water’s edge with a completely different feel to the others. When Terry and I got to there we decided we would head for the beach and get ourselves a drink. It was lovely just sitting in the beach enjoying the sun, especially when the forecast was for rain most of the day. We were sitting and relaxing and then got a message from Rylan asking where we were. He had made it to town in probably a little over an hour. Pretty good going. He said the climb out of the last town was pretty tough but it was OK from there. Oh, to be young and fit, although I’m pretty happy with my effort. We were going to catch the ferry back to get a different perspective on the towns but it was getting late and with the light fading so we opted for the train home.

Cinque Terre was all I expected it to be and it’s quite amazing the difference in the five towns that are geographically so close. We returned to La Spezia exhausted and hungry and found a little restaurant that was cheap and offered a small menu that changes almost daily based on what is available. The staff were lovely and the meal was delicious.

Tomorrow we are back to Rome to finish our trip.