04/29/2022: Cinque Terre

The Cinque Terre has been on my bucket list for a long time. The pictures I’ve seen of the 5 villages just look so beautiful. Christine got me a jigsaw puzzle earlier this year that was a wonderful picture of Manarola. After I finished it, we left it on the card table in our living room and every day I would say, “I can’t believe we’re going to go there.”

The Cinque Terre is now a national park and UNESCO world heritage site. Historically, the area was important for trade and security due to its tactical location near the Mediterranean Sea. And of course, there is Roman history and influence. Most of the villages were controlled by the Romans, but I did read that the Greeks may have been the first conquering inhabitants of Riomaggiore. Certainly you know that Romans were involved with Corniglia, which gets its name from Gens Cornelia, one of the greatest patrician houses of Rome.

Over the centuries people have built terraces on the rugged, steep landscape right up to the cliffs that overlook the Ligurian Sea. The main agricultural products are grapes and olives. You also see lemon trees everywhere. Paths, trains, and boats connect the villages as cars can only reach them with great difficulty from the outside via narrow and precarious mountain roads, but cars are not allowed in the villages. Unfortunately, many of the paths between the villages are closed due to landslides that have devastated the area. The landslides are partially caused by the disappearing agriculture in the area. The terraces of rubble stone walls are eroding and falling down because the farmers are leaving and this causes significant water runoff leading to the landslides. It’s interesting to note that the arrival of the train connecting all the villages with the outside world also had a detrimental effect because local people migrated out in search of an easier life. But the trains brought the hordes of tourists which is what keeps the economy of the area propped up. All the villages are jammed with tourists now. I can’t imagine what it is like at the height of the tourist season which is quickly approaching.

Our adventure today started with a short bus ride down to the train station. We haven’t braved the Lardarina, the nearly 400 steps down (and we will never do the Lardarina coming up!). Trains are frequent and so we were in the southern-most of the 5 villages, Riomaggiore, in just a few minutes. This small village feels like a working village. It has a very narrow, but busy harbor where fishermen are active. Walking down to the harbor from the train station you go through a long tunnel and then once out of the tunnel you kind of get funneled down the main street to the harbor, which is where all the action is. You can go up a set of stairs to a viewing platform overlooking the harbor. We sat and had a cappuccino at a little cafe overlooking the harbor.

We decided to take a boat tour in order to see all 5 villages from the sea. Christine isn’t happy near water unless she can get on a boat. There is essentially a “bus boat” that travels to 4 of the villages and this is how lots of people get from village to village. We chose a ticket from Riomaggiore, the southern-most village to Monterosso, the northern-most village because we wanted to see the whole Cinque Terre coastline. So did about 300 other tourists queued up to get on the boat so it was difficult to find a spot where you could see and get some good photos.

We disembarked in Monterosso and strolled around the older section. It was a little less touristy so we could take our time and enjoy the lovely village. We found a really interesting church, St. John the Baptist Church, which had a striped exterior. The style of the architecture is called Ligurian Gothic, unique to this region of Italy. The exterior had alternating stripes of white marble and dark green (which looked black) serpentine marble. The interior was amazing in white and dark green. It is also famous for its beautiful rosette window.

Here are a couple of other photos taken in Monterosso.

We walked over to the newer section of Monterosso which is much more trendy, but we found a restaurant right over the water and had a great lunch listening to the sea lapping the shoreline. Monterosso has a couple of long, pebbly beaches so this is where people come to sunbathe and swim. We actually saw people in the sea, but watching them get into the water demonstrated by their faces just how cold the water is.

After lunch we were off by train to Vernazza, just a couple of minutes away. Vernazza, historically, had a very important harbor and was a trading center. The harbor, although small, is the place to hang out. It has a very long breakwater with a bench running the entire length. We were able to sit in the shade and just watch the goings on. There is a small beach so kids were playing and others were sunbathing on the rocks.

By now we were getting tired so we headed back to Corniglia. We think we picked the perfect place to stay. It feels like a real little neighborhood and not a very touristy area, although lots of tourists come to see the village during the day. But by evening, the tourists are gone and the locals come out to enjoy an evening stroll calling our to each other and catching up on the news of the day. This morning, I saw how people get their supplies. Just below our balcony, vans pulled up and set up tables showing wares. You can see from the photo below the hardware van and the bulk supplies van.

The Cinque Terre is an amazing and interesting place. I’m very glad we decided to come. Initially, with our planning, I thought we could do Cinque Terre (my bucket list) or the Amalfi Coast (Christine’s bucket list). I was worried that so many stops and changes of Aibnbs and hotels would be too tiring. Yes, we are tired, but this has been so worth it. Tomorrow we’ll go to the one remaining village that we haven’t visited, Manarola, so I can see in person my jigsaw puzzle picture.

One thought on “04/29/2022: Cinque Terre”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *