It was a rough time convincing someone to go with me, yes I'm that unpopular, but I've become okay with it... lol.. luckily, jeff came along
Cinque Terre is a stretch of breathtaking seaside along the Mediterranean Ocean. Five towns are connected by an 18km (a little over 11 mile) hiking trail that people travel from all over the world to walk and relive the lives of the people who first created the trails along with their special villages. Luckily, this euphoria is a hop, skip, and a jump from Torino; well, three hours of hopping, skipping and jumping, but close just the same.
My roommate Jeff from Nevada and I took off for Cinque Terre on Sunday. We were hoping to avoid some of the expected tourists since Monday was yet another Italian holiday. We didn’t leave quite as early as we had hoped but we arrived by 4pm and still wanted to do some of the hiking that evening. This, in retrospect, was a really good move. People can get on the hiking trail at any of the five villages but most tend to start from Monterosso or Riomaggiore. We checked into our apartment-like room and hit the trail. The first stretch is fondly referred to as “the street of love” or Via Dell’ Amore. This, I assume, is because some of the most picturesque sites can be seen here. Also, this part of the trail is an extremely easy hike. There is a cement sidewalk and in some sports the entire thing is covered. Inside, on the walls, bears the names of many lovers who have once passed through the tunnel next to the seaside.
Jeff and I took out the first three towns with little problem. The hike between the third and the fourth town is estimated to be two hours long and the longest of all the trails. This trail wound back into the hillside a little bit more and we were anxious to see the ocean again. There are many signs along the trail that point to beaches for public use. Some of these are notorious for being nude beaches; luckily, we didn’t have any run-ins with anybody unclothed. However, we did happen to run into four other people in our program that were just coming up from a nude beach. They didn’t get nude themselves, but they confirmed that the beach did exist in its entirety.
It just so happened that our friends were going in the same direction we were so we hooked up and hiked the rest of the jaunt together. When we started to descent into the fourth town, Vernazza, we realized that it was probably to late to go any further. The logical thing to do was find a place to eat and take in the village life. Our choice wasn’t easy, all of the towns are very accustomed to tourists. The restaurant we did choose had outdoor seating and an older Italian waiter who kept us laughing all night. Dinner was spectacular. Any area along the seaside in Italy is known for it’s seafood and Cinque Terre is no exception. After dinner we said our goodbyes and headed back to our respective towns for the evening.
In the morning, Jeff and I decided to hike the last trail so we hopped the train to Vernazza. It is very easy to go Cinque Terre and participate in no hiking whatsoever because of the train, but that doesn’t sound nearly as much fun. Our hike began around 1pm and I was suddenly aware of how lucky we were to hike later in the day the evening before. There were all sorts of people on the same trail that we were and the last trail, between Vernazza and Monterosso, is said to be the most difficult. It didn’t help at all that the trial was rather narrow and Jeff and I both had our backpacks on. At various times we would be clinging to anything we could to allow the passage of other hikers. In my opinion, there were too many. I’m pretty accustomed to hiking in the Porcupine Mountains and Pictured Rocks in the UP, I’ve never seen as many people as I did on these trails. The one cool thing about it was that you got to try and decipher just what type of nationality you were coming up to. We met Germans, French, other Americans and obviously Italians. It was really a unique experience.
That sums up this weekend’s adventure! Hopefully I’ve got a few more good adventures left before I return to the States in June. I’m off to do the school thing!
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