We’d been looking forward to Cinque Terre for some time and are happy to say it pulled out all stops and lived up to our expectations. The great weather, perfect temperature and beautiful scenery contributed to a really great time.
We took the train from Nice along the French Riviera over the border and were a little worried that the trains might not be running in Italy due to a public holiday. No need to worry, the trip panned out fine, although the train stopped at every stop and was quite painfully slow. Those of you who have been to Cinque Terre will know that you have to be somewhat fit just to get around! We arrived at the last of the 5 towns, Riomaggiore, and hiked up to the top of the town to check in. We then had to leg it all the way back down again to our actual apartment which was a seaside view right on the port at the bottom. Hiking up and down with an extra 14kg on your back is a little bit difficult. The view and the feel of our apartment was incredibly nice! Ahh the serenity. The sound of waves crashing into shore, which was quite literally just outside our window, was loud but so relaxing.
On our first full day we began with chocolate croissants dipped in cafe latte in one of the cute little restaurants in Riomaggiore. Then we put our suncream on and set off on what we thought would be a short hike up to the top of the mountain above Riomaggiore. Never turns out that way though and it ended up being about a 6+ hour hike, 750m above sea level with a great deal of stairs and steep climbing. It was very rewarding getting to the very top and we had wonderful views over the whole coastline of Cinque Terre and the steep valleys with the little towns nestled in each. We took a gnarly descent to get home and when we were approx 20mins from home we came across a trail closure and realised we would have to take a much longer route home via the road which wound back and forth from one side of the mountain to the other making a very slow descent. It probably added and extra hour or so to the journey and our feet were really starting to feel it but we had no choice but to keep plodding along until we finally arrived back into town. Had a big dinner of a huge pizza and bottle of local red wine. Then finished off the day watching the sun set over the Mediterranean.
The next day we had planned to walk the coastal route through each of the five towns and take it pretty easy, however because of another route closure between Manerola and Vanezza, it turned out we were in for a much much bigger hike which took us first along the coast via the Dell’Amore (“Love Walk”) to Manerola, then up, up, up to Volastra then traversed and climbed futher over the mountains so we could look down on Corniglia. Another gnarly descent, took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up taking the road down into Vanezza where we planned to have a late lunch.
As we were dragging our sorry, tired feet into Vanezza we realised why such a big part of the coastal trail was closed. October last year saw a huge flash flood go through the town of Vanezza. It’s a huge shame because it was the most picturesque of all the towns and they are still struggling to clean it up. So many businesses and houses were completely ruined. The water level was really high and the damage was great. We still were able to have lunch there and a great many tourists were passing through regardless.
We were sitting over lunch and feeling really quite sick as a result of the amount of hiking we were doing. The last stretch of road into the town was especially hard – going downhill on your feet really kills and takes it out of you after so many hours. We were still feeling it from the huge ascent not to mention hike the day before. I told Isaac I didn’t think I could carry on for the final part of the hike into the last town of Monterosso. He convinced me to push on as we’d probably regret not doing it. I warned him that I was currently running on fumes, the tank was empty, and I will most definitely go bananas from sheer exhaustion and most probably rip into him in a demon-ish bad temper later into the hike. He said he was prepared for that. So we carried on.
Well, I predicted correctly, halfway through this last part (which was an extra couple of hours of hiking) I lashed out with such a verocity of temper that I felt like some kind of demon possessed me. I ended up having a bit of a cry, and was then ready to keep going. Isaac was struggling too but he didn’t need to have a cry to keep on going! Surprisingly I felt somewhat ok after the cry and couldn’t even feel the burn in my legs and feet anymore and we finished off the hike at surprising speed.
We were planning to catch the ferry home to Riomaggiore however we read the timetable incorrectly and the boat we had planned to take home didn’t run on that day and there were no boats left. Nevertheless, we caught the train back. Had fish and chips for dinner, which we gulped down and went to sleep dead tired.
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