Man, what a place! I really can't put into words. Certainly one of the most amazing places I have ever seen. Five little villages built upon cliffs hanging over the sea. Each connected to another by hiking trails that often cling to the sides of the cliffs hundreds of feet above the sea. The villages were built ages ago with the hope that the cliffs would protect them from Pirates. Some time ago, Italy declared the towns as National Parks, so there could be no new new building in the area. There are no normal hotels or resorts, only people that rent rooms in the old buildings.
Teeny and I stayed in the town of Vernazza which is in the center of the five. We had to climb over 100 stairs to get to our room. Since the towns are built upon cliffs, everything is up, up, up! Most of the stairs are through narrow cobblestone alleyways between the cliffs and buildings. The buildings are so integrated into the cliffs that some of the walls in the rooms are rock. Sometimes you can barely see where the "building" ends and the cliff begins. It is truly amazing, and built so long ago!
We had reservations for 1 night but ended up staying for 5. There was no internet so I couldn't get on to update the blog. We actually left several days ago, but haven't had decent internet until now. Unfortunately, where we have internet today there is no power so I am racing against my PC's battery to get something up. I could go on all day about the Cinque Terre, but my battery is already down one notch. So, I'll get to the pics and try to add more later
This is one of the terraces where we stayed. Teeny and I were up late every night drinking beer here and watching the ocean. This is also where we made new friends with a few other travelers.
An example of the buildings integrated into the cliff.
A view of Vernazza from the trail. Our room was just below the tower in the distance.
Waiting for Teeny to finish taking her 10,000th picture of some tiny flower growing between the rocks, or maybe it was a bug, or a little lizard.
Typical view along the trail.
More trail
More views from the trail
Hiking into Corniglia. You have to climb over 300 stairs to get from the train station to the town. When we got there we saw bewildered tourists getting off the train with tons of luggage and looking up at the stairs.
This part of the trail, passing through Corniglia
Typical! Over 100 of these to get to our room.
We asked the waiter to take a picture of us, then he turned the camera on himself. He was quite a character.
We met this young couple (Eric and Anna) on our first night when we splurged and had dinner in the Castle tower. Our table was on a balcony that hangs over the ocean. The waves crashed on the rocks right below us and the splashing water almost reached up to where we were sitting.
We really enjoyed these two and continued to meet up with them during our stay. They had just gotten engaged the day before! Eric popped the question at a beautiful spot along the trail, overlooking Vernazza. The next day Teeny and hiked that portion of the trail and met another couple that were on their honeymoon. As I was telling them about Eric and Anna we realized that we were standing at the very spot where he proposed! The whole place drips of romance. We met other couples on honeymoons as well. I sufficiently embarrassed both of them by announcing their engagement to everyone at the restaurant. Everyone gave them a nice round of applause and the waiter brought them Terimisu with a candle on it. I really have to say that we were so impressed with both of them. Just a really nice young couple that were enjoyable to hang out with right from the start. Anna is in residency to become an internal medicine pediatrician and Eric is in business management. Fantastic couple, I really hope we meet them again someday!
More to come...
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