Ciao!
Tyler and I are in Rome, Italy now where we’ve been since yesterday morning. Our time in Cinque Terre was amazing and so instead of talking about Rome, I’m going to go back in time and talk about our time in paradise. Cinque Terre translates from Italian to English as “Five Lands”, and that’s what it is- 5 beautiful towns on the western coast of Italy. The towns are Monterossa, Vernazza, Manarola, Riomaggiore, and Corniglia.
The train ride to Cinque Terre from Interlaken was kind of stressful because we had to take a few trains and I had the times mixed up in my head. So I woke up the morning we were leaving thinking we were way behind schedule. Everything worked out though and we were able to take all the trains we planned to catch. The final train from Milan to Monterossa (one of the 5 towns of Cinque Terre) was our longest ride and we were able to settle in and relax. We were in one of the 6-person rooms on the train and our companions were 3 really funny women from Tazmania.
When the train was boarding, they arrived at our car with some random guy following them. He lugged their suitcases into the overhead compartment without them asking and then he refused to leave until they paid him even though they didn’t ask for his help. I was just going to sit there and wait for him to leave, but Tyler was nice enough to give him change to get him to go away. The women were so impressed by how much of a gentleman Tyler was and kept saying, “ohh I bet my son would do that!” They had really funny British sounding accents and were just hilarious to listen to because they weren’t used to riding trains. Me and Tyler were both really tired from our previous train rides and just sat in silence listening to them and sleeping for most of the ride but near the end we started to talk to them and they were awesome. Their names were Carol, Carol, and Lynette. After the train ride, Tyler and I referred to them as the Carols teehee. The Carol sitting next to me was originally from Cape Town, South Africa and had been travelling visiting old friends for the past 3 weeks and was spending her last 2 weeks of travel with Carol and Lynette. It was so cool seeing these 3 women still having new experiences and learning about different cultures. Also, they were so fun and easy to talk to! I’ve learned during this period of travel that I’m really a pretty quiet person most of the time and 8/10 times when I get on a train I’m perfectly content just sitting there and looking out the window. These ladies had the personality that I hope someday to grow into because it seems like it would be a lot of fun!
We finally made it to our destination of Monterossa and boy was it packed. I had a terrible headache and was feeling dizzy from the heat, so the enormous crowds of people in what I expected to be a secluded vacation spot was the last thing I wanted to deal with. The landscape, however, was absolutely beautiful. The water was deep blue and the sun was shining bright, which was exactly what I’d been hoping for. We eventually caught our next train to the town of Riomaggiore where we booked our hostel for the next 3 nights. When we got to Riomaggiore we quickly learned that even though we were out of the Swiss Alps, we were far from being done with hiking. We walked uphill for about 10 minutes (later, realizing there was a much less painful shortcut we could have taken) to get into town where we found our hostel office and got checked in. Our room ended up being really awesome with a great view of the sea and it was away from the main town center, which made catching up on sleep that first night awesome.
Before getting to sleep though, we got some dinner and drinks and sat on some big rocks by the sea to watch the sunset. Tyler ended up going out onto the jetty while I sat and relaxed in our more secluded spot and he ended up making a friend that he talked to for what felt like a million years. The guy’s name was Travis and he and his girlfriend had just gotten engaged a couple
of days ago. We ended up running into Travis several times over the next few days so it was pretty convenient to have just met him that first night.
After relaxing for a little longer we headed back to the hostel and went to sleep. I slept in the next morning because that’s what I do best and when I got up, Tyler was just getting back with some breakfast and this delicious orange soda (sorry Mommy, I’m not being very healthy here). When he was out in town that morning, he ran into the Carols and they gave him a map of Cinque Terre outlining the hiking trails and recommended that we hike the one coastal trail that was open. So that, we did! We took the train to Monterrossa, walked around town, got some lunch, ran into the Carols, then hiked the coastal trail to Vernazza. We ran into Travis near the beginning of the hike, so that was cool but aside from that it was just amazingly beautiful. The color of the water contrasting with the rich green trees was incredible and we both took a ton of pictures. The hike was about 2 hours, but it took a little longer since it was raining on and off and we had to stop for cover a few times.
Getting to Vernazza was nice because we had the chance to explore a different town. This one was much smaller but had a great bunch of waterfront rocks to sit on. A group of people from Ohio was sitting near us on our rock drinking a bottle of wine and having a good time. We were tired and decided to head back to Rio where we had dinner and played cards late into the night.
The next day we decided to head to Corniglia, the town that is only accessible by climbing 365 steps ( or by taking the bus that’ll do the climbing for you). The steps were easier to climb than the ones to our hostel so it wasn’t bad. The town was much bigger and offered incredible views being so high up. We had gelato and hung out in this area that had awesome ocean views.
Strangely, our train to the base of the town was packed, but getting there, we found plenty of empty areas that were really cool. We saw the Carols while walking around and decided not to catch up and say hi because we surely would have looked like stalkers at that point. We didn’t stay in Corniglia too long because we wanted to make sure we had time to see the 5th and last town on our list, Manarola.
Manarola was amazing. By far both of our favorites. There was an area off the land with lots of rocks, one very tall one that people were jumping off of into the water. The beginning of the coastal path was open so we went there and stared at the beautiful town. Words can’t describe the beauty. We got a late lunch where I had the best meal I’ve had in all of Europe (a place called Marina Piccola, check it out if you’re there!)- homemade pasta with crabs and tomato sauce. It was delicious.
On our way out of Manarola we saw the Carols and decided it was time to take a picture together. Overall we had an awesome time in Cinque Terre and I can’t wait to go back in the future!
