Our first train took us to Florance, where we got off and walked around for an hour. We were soon on another train to Pisa and enjoyed watching the beautiful scenery as we left the city of Florance and passed through the region of Tuscany.
We arrived in Pisa around 2pm and decided to take advantage of our 2 hour lay over to visit the leaning tower of Pisa! We went to the tourist office and got a map to direct us to the site. However, for some reason my map reading skills were not honed that day and I ended up taking us to the east of the tower - thankfully upon looking around we were able to spot it from a distance!
Mom and I were not extremely enthusiastic about seeing the tower - but we thought since we were in Pisa we needed to take the 20 minute walk and check it out. Upon coming up to the tower we both were extremely impressed! It was SO cool - especially from the angle we approached it from, the tower was leaning so far you had to wonder why it did not topple over! Plus, the tower itself was beautiful - with ornate carvings and beautiful white stone. Both of us stood for a few minutes in awe and kept asking each other how it could be?
We spent about half an hour looking around the grounds where the tower is and taking advantage of photo ops (however we did not do the classic photos of us pushing the tower up - we could just not position ourselves rightly!). It was truly an incredible thing to see and we were so glad that we had the opportunity to visit Pisa in the end.
We then took the train heading towards the Cinque Terre, planning to get off in the city of La Spezia - the gateway to the Cinque Terre - to book our tickets to Switzerland for when we left. Unfortunately we ended up getting off at the wrong station, one on the outskirts of La Spezia. We knew something wasn't quite right because when we went to find a ticket office to book our tickets to Switzerland we realized there was no ticket office at that station and ended up in the control room with the engineers! Here we were, two Canadian women pulling suitcases behind us standing just inside the door of the control room looking at a roomful of Italian men yelling at each other! We both did not know what to do so we just stood there until they looked up at us and asked what we were doing - first in Italian and afterwards in English when they realized that was the only language we could speak! Thankfully a very nice man came up to us and asked us where we needed to be and told us what train to take and what time it was coming - so even without a train office to inquire in we were able to find our way to the correct place thanks to the kindness of this man!
We stopped in at the La Spezia main train station to book our Switzerland tickets and then continued onto the town in the Cinque Terre where we were staying, called Riomaggiore. By the time we arrived it was around 6pm and already dark out. I had booked our accommodation online at a place called Rio Rooms - which is not a hotel or a B&B but rather different apartments scattered throughout the town. My reservation instructions were to call the number given when we arrived in Riomaggiore and we would be told where to go! I was a little nervous about this arrangement as I cannot speak Italian and had never had arrangements such as these before, but I dialed the number and was quickly speaking to Ugo, the man I presume who owns the properties. He spoke to me in broken English and when I told him we were at the train station he told me "you stay there" and he would come and meet us in 5 minutes to show us to the apartment. Sure enough a few minutes later an older man was walking down the hill towards us with a big smile and we met Ugo! He took us into the town and up to our apartment - thankfully we had a personal escort to deliver us to the apartment otherwise we would never have found it. All the Cinque Terre towns are built on the cliffs overlooking the ocean and thus the buildings are stacked one on top of the other - so in order for us to get to our apartment we had to walk up staircases and go down alleyways to find the address - again it was somewhat like a maze, and in the dark we would have been hopeless!
When Ugo took us into our apartment we were delighted - it was perfect! We had the usual trappings of a small apartment - a little kitchen with a fridge and stove, a bathroom, a bedroom - but the best part was the sun room and terrace overlooking the ocean! We were so happy that night when we arrived, but even happier the next morning when we woke up to see the large terrace and view from it in the morning light!
The night we arrived we went out for dinner at a little Italian restaurant below our apartment - we sat in a sealed terrace with heat lamps and I ate the most delicious ravioli and mom had fresh grilled tuna and vegetables. It was a lovely dinner and when we were finished we walked over the a little store nearby that was still open and bought a 2 euro bottle of wine and chocolate to take up to our apartment and enjoy!
The next morning we spent some time standing on our balcony taking in the view and marveling at the scenery by day light. It was marvelous to look to your right and see the ocean and look to your left and see the mountains. And below us was the town's center street and at one end the little harbour where the fishing boats left from for early morning fishing!
We ate our breakfast in the sun room and then got ready for the day. I decided to blow dry my hair and unfortunately ended up blowing a breaker and all the lights went out in the apartment! Mom and I looked in the fuse box to try and determine which switch had been tripped but could not tell as they were all in the same position. Not wanting to touch anything I shouldn't, I hesitantly called Ugo again to try and explain the situation and what had happened in English - hoping he would understand what I was saying. As soon as he answered and I said who was calling he asked "what's wrong?". I explained what had happened and he immediately said "we come, we come"! Half an hour later his wife showed up at our apartment and was looking questioningly into the fuse box. She tried a few things and still, there was no power. I started to panic and was worried I did something terribly wrong! Ugo's wife opened the door and beckoned the first two men she saw into the apartment and they exchanged words in rapid fire Italian. The men were able to locate another fuse box (I think?) and had the electricity back on in 2 minutes! I decided not to blow dry my again while in the Cinque Terre!
We had planned to spend the day hiking between the five villages of the Cinque Terre on the coastal hiking path that connects them. We had been advised to start at the opposite end of the Cinque Terra from where we were, in Monterrosso, and hike towards home. We went to the little train station we had arrived at last night to buy our Cinque Terre train pass for the day (lets you take the little train in between all the villages an unlimited amount of times during the day) to go to Monterrosso to begin our hike and were informed that the coastal path was closed due to the fact there had been heavy rains the week previous and it was not safe to be on.
Mom and I were very disappointed initially - we had been looking forward to doing the hike along the ocean! However, we decided to go to Monterrosso anyway and spend the day going to each town and looking around. It was sunny and getting increasingly warm out as the morning coolness faded away and we arrived in Monterrosso around 11 am.
Monterrosso is probably the largest of the Cinque Terre towns, and it has an expanse of beach where mom and I walked and watched people swimming. It not even occurred to me to bring my bathing suit on this trip but at that moment I regretted it! It was warm enough to go swimming in the ocean and lay on the beach in the sun!
Mom and I then walked up into the town and into the hills above it. There were a lot of inclines and stairs for our prairie legs to conquer but we enjoyed being outside in the sun and feeling the "burn"! Upon coming back down into the town and onto the beach we decided to reward ourselves with a treat - gelato! I had peach and lemon while mom tried the walnut and strawberry. Gelato in Italy is truly fantastic - the flavours, particularly of the fruit variety, burst with flavour!
When we were finished exploring Monterrosso we took the train to the next town, Vernazza. It was another beautiful village filled with little shops and cafes and had a really cute little harbour filled with fishing boats. We did a little bit of shopping and enjoyed exploring the little streets and alleyways of the town.
The whole time we were in the Cinque Terre we both felt as if we were just looking in on the life of the locals. It did not feel to us that all the little shops, cafes, etc were there for tourists, but rather were places where the locals frequented and also served the tourists that were passing through. This may have been due largely to the fact that mom and I were there in the low tourist season - but it really did feel to us that we were able to observe and enjoy the way of life that the locals experienced. This was particularly true in Riomaggiore, where we stayed in the apartment. Every morning our neighbours would be out on their own terraces hanging up their laundry, the women talking to each other through their windows and yelling at their children in the streets below and we would see the men coming in from the ocean after their long early morning fishing expeditions. It was very refreshing after being in Venice where everything is geared towards tourists and before going to Paris where we found the situation largely similar to Venice.
We decided we should try and visit the next town, Corniglia, before night fell, so we took the train that we thought would take us there. However, it whizzed by Corniglia and the next stop was back in La Spezia! Ooops! By the time we got on a train taking us back into the Cinque Terre it was already dark so we got off in Riomaggiore and decided to spend the evening in our apartment as it was dark and getting cold out.
My mom had read somewhere in one of her travel books that the Cinque Terre was known for its amazing focaccia bread, so we went to a little store that was still open and picked up the ingredients for a salad and also a big package of focaccia bread. Wow - I am so glad my mom did her research, the focaccia was amazing! The best I have ever had! It was crisp and crunchy on the outside and soft and moist in the inside from all the wonderful olive oil they used to make it. So delicious!!!
After dinner we spent the rest of the night reading, me in the bedroom and mom in the sun room and went to bed early after a full day of walking and being in the sun!
The next day we went to the next town, Manarola, by train and looked around for the morning before walking back to Riomaggiore. The only part of the coastal path that was open was between these two towns - so we left Manarola round noon to walk back to Riomaggiore. We wanted to spend some lazy hours laying in the sun on our terrace so we decided to head back for when the afternoon heat set in. The coastal path was really a very even, easy walk between these two villages and we had a nice "stroll" back to Riomaggiore. It was gorgeous to look back as we walked at Manarola, set on the cliffs, and to see Riomaggiore as we approached it. It was definitely a view that you do not get while arriving by train, so we were thankful that we were able to experience even part of the coastal path before leaving.
We picked up a coke for me, a beer for mom and some focaccia bread for us both for lunch and ate it happily on our terrace! Not the healthiest lunch, but we were indulging and trying to eat as much focaccia before we left! We spent the next few hours in lounge chairs on our terrace in the sun - dressed in shorts and tank tops and loving every minute of it!
When the afternoon heat started to fade we decided to stop being lazy and explore Riomaggiore! We walked down to the little harbour, up the center street and into the mountains above the town. We may have been biased, but this was our favorite village in the Cinque Terre!
When the sun started to fade we made our way back down into the village from the hills and were able to look down on the town as the sun was beginning to set. It was so beautiful with the sun shimmering on the water and the town glowing in the soft light. What an incredible place - it was unlike anywhere I had ever been before.
We spent our last night eating a homemade pasta dinner and more focaccia (so many carbs!). We went to bed early as the next day we needed to be up at 5:30am to catch our first train on our journey to Switzerland. We woke up in the dark and made our way to the train station. We said goodbye to the Cinque Terre just as the sun was rising over the cliffs and got one last breath taking view....
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