Riomaggiore and Cinque Terre (Italy Post #9)

Last but not least: our final stay in Italy. After over 20 days of travel, trains, tourists, and cities, Carson and I traveled from Florence up to the famous coastal National Park and UNESCO World Heritage site of Cinque Terre. Known for its breathtaking views and intense hikes, we wanted to spend our time relaxing on the beaches and enjoying the ocean. The rains came on our first 2 nights though, so unfortunately we only spent one-day hiking and exploring around.

Our AirBnB was very, very neat. It was a small, 200-year-old farmhouse located about 45 minutes from the town of Riomaggiore. We decided to pay the host's friend, Mario, to come and pick us up with all our stuff near the train station in La Spezia and drive us (literally) up and over the mountain. It was about a 30-minute drive that zigged and zagged all the way up, before reaching the edge of the park where Mario parked and led us to the house. The steps and the path were hilarious. Skinny stone steps carved out of the mountainside guided us up to a narrow path that was nearly overgrown, falling apart in some sections to reveal the steep slope below. We were extra cautious walking in with our full packs.

Once we reached our house, we were greeted with a cool wind coming off the coast and a spectacular view. The reason we had booked this place came to light. You could see right down to the rocky cliffs of the Cinque Terre coast! The house itself was built right out of the cliffside and had two entrances, with an entrance at the base for the kitchen, dining room, and bathroom, and another outer entrance up a set of stairs where the bedroom was. It was quaint and cute, with the best view yet.

We decided to get some warmer clothes on and hike down to Riomaggioraie that afternoon and planned to be up by the evening to make dinner. We got lost. Twice. And probably trespassed across some farmer's backyard as we tried to figure out where we were too. It all made sense eventually, we just had to look for the tiny, 4ft tall signs reading "0.5 to Riomaggiore".

Once we were on the trail, it was basically straight downhill. We took the longer route the first time we descended as we knew it was going to kick our butts. From the top of the hill, we could just see the tops of the buildings of the town, surrounded by hills, terraces, and cliffs. On our way down we didn't see very much. We were just focused on not sliding down the mountain.

In the town, there were quite a few people still mulling about, even though it was getting to be late afternoon. We headed straight for the coast, passing by souvenir shops, pizza places, fried fish restaurants, cheese and meat shops, and some cute patios too. Then, we went under the train tracks, through a walkway and the street opened up into a boat yard. Little metal placards on the ground denoted each individual boat's "parking" space along the sides of the street. In the harbor, there were large rocks and a big wharf with people sitting and talking. We climbed up the steps on the southern side of the bay and took some beautiful photos of the colorful townhouses.

Since it was getting dark by the time we decided to head back up to our home, we took the Cinque Terre Park bus up to a nearby monastery before hiking about 15 minutes over to our house. We still had to hike straight up a bunch of stone steps to reach it, so I'm glad we opted out of the 45-minute hike from the bottom.

As luck would have it, we had arrived just as a big storm was settling over Italy. Yay. We were thankful that we had spent a few hours in Riomaggioarie on our first day because we didn't leave the house at all on the second, thanks to strong winds and lots of rain. It would have been able to hike down that hillside again anyways since both of us were already sore from the first time.

We made our way back down to Riomaggiore on our third day and spent the day traveling between the 5 towns of Cinque Terre. You simply had to buy a train ticket and get off at the different towns. There was also a hiking trail between all of the coastal towns, but I think you would have to be crazy to want to hike that all day. All of the trails go straight up a cliff and then back down the other side to the towns below. There was one town, Corniglia, that was actually nestled in the cliffs above the train station rather than in the bay like the other ones...many people would walk to the base of the stairs, look up and walk back to the train. Us included.

We spent some time in the farthest town, Monterosso first. It was a cute little stretch of town right above a beach, with little gelato and cafe shops and patios lining the skinny street. Right at the end of the beach, the characteristic Cinque Terre cliffs shot up, making for a beautiful backdrop as we sipped espresso. We had breakfast and sat around with the ocean right next to us. It was the perfect little spot.

Next, we jumped on the train and ended up in Vernazza. It was similar to Riomaggiore with a small harbor, colorful ships and houses, and small tourist shops and restaurants lining the streets.

Corniglia was the next town, but we admired 382 the steps from below and spent some time looking at the coastline instead of enduring the hike. Lazy, we know lol. Instead, Carson decided to pick one of the cacti fruits growing on the cliffs near the train tracks to try. We had previously bought a cacti fruit in one of the markets and it was very large and juicy, but had a ton of seeds that you had to spit out and only a mild flavor with yellow flesh. This one was different. Apparently, these cacti grow 2 forms of fruit from different stages of flowering. One at the beginning of summer that gets cut off and sold, and then another, smaller than the one we had tried before, in the first one's place. The second fruit was dark purple, still just as juicy and seedy, but packed full of delicious flavour. Carson's fingers and mouth were stained purple from peeling the fruit and spitting out the seeds.

Manarola was the closest town to Riomaggiore and was built next to the water, but some of the buildings on the nearby cliffs towered over the rest of the town. Here, we spent some time sitting on the rocks and soaking up the sun, regretting not bringing our bathing suits with us. The water was so clear and there were people kayaking, swimming, and cliff jumping. As we were walking back towards the center of town, the path came level to the rocks people were cliff jumping from. No one had jumped from the top yet, but we saw an older man climbing to the top, calling out to his son who was standing next to us if there was anything he could hit if he jumped from the top. Not only did this guy jump from the highest point, he did a backwards diving trick into the water! Everyone watching clapped and cheered haha.

Back in Riomaggiore, Carson and I went to catch the bus back home so we could make some supper. We ended up having to wait over an hour for the next bus so we decided to grab a snack and go sit on the rocks and watch the sun fade away. We had missed sunset, but the colors of the sky were still quite pretty, especially with the sound of the waves in the background. It was a very bittersweet ending to our Italy trip.

The next morning, we hiked our way down to the parking lot and met Mario once again, who graciously drove us back down the mountain to the La Spezia train station. We spent the entire day on a train as we finished our travels of Italy right back where we started: Napoli. Thankfully our AirBnB this time was located a 10-minute walk away from the airport, so we could relax, eat our dinner, and be rested for our early morning flight back home.

I have one funny anecdote to add about the flight home. We flew from Naples to Frankfurt on the morning of October 28th where we had a 4-hour layover before boarding so we hung around the airport and had some food and a nap before waiting outside our gate. First, the flight ended up being delayed by about 30 minutes due to how many people were coming through with immigration papers that needed to be double-checked. Then, we all boarded and were settling down to take off when we heard an announcement: The pilot we were scheduled to have was not allowed to fly the plane since we were flying over British airspace and he didn't have enough hours to meet the British standards. So we waited around another 45 minutes for a different pilot to come down and fly our plane. Once he got there, another announcement was heard. At this point, I was passed out and Carson was still awake and listening. The pilot introduced himself and apologized because engine 1 had failed to start so the engineers had to come down to take a look at it. About 30 minutes went by before the final announcement came across the intercom. "Well, we are just about ready to go here. Turns out, one of the engineers was able to go out and start engine 1 with a screwdriver, so we'll be on our way shortly." Talk about an encouraging message right before we fly for 9 hours across the ocean.

Thanks to everyone who has followed my travels and given such positive feedback! This will be the last post of my Italy travels. There may be more updates in the future if I ever do anything out of the ordinary and feel the urge to write out it for people to read. Cheers! Bye for now :)