The day I fell off the side of a cliff.
Trip Start
Jan 10, 2010
1
11
15
Trip End
May 15, 2010
Where I stayed
Pisa - Welcome Bed and Breakfast
Riomaggiore - Cinque Terre Holidays
Cinque Terre, Pisa, Liguria, Italy
Monday, April 19, 2010
Let me start by talking about Pisa:
Pisa = Leaning Tower of Pisa = a ton of people taking pictures pretending to hold the tower up = very overrated. The end.
Now, moving on to Cinque Terre:
If there is one place that I will never forget, it is Cinque Terre. So, where do I begin? Well, we left Munich on Monday afternoon to fly into Pisa (closest airport to Cinque Terre). We stayed in Pisa Monday night, got up early Tuesday morning to see the Leaning Tower (you already know my feelings about said tourist attraction), and jumped on a train to head to Riomaggiore. Just to clarify, Cinque Terre is essentially five villages connected by a walking trail that spans about 11 km (or about 7 miles) along the Mediterranean Sea... No big deal. Also, for reference, the towns, in order, are Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore.
We decided to stay in Riomaggiore Tuesday night because the next morning we would take a train to Monterosso, hike through the five towns, and then retrieve our luggage from the hostel before catching a train to Florence that night. It is possible to do the hike from Riomaggiore to Monterosso, but the hardest part of the hike is between Monterosso and Corniglia so it is recommended to start in Monterosso.
I am glad we had the extra half of a day to spend in Riomaggiore the night before the hike because the area was absolutely gorgeous! We went down to the water to lie out on some cliff rocks overlooking the sea for a while before heading back up to our apartment/hostel to get ready for dinner. Our hostel turned out to be a small apartment - complete with kitchen, bathroom and upstairs bedroom - tucked up into the side of a mountain. Even though it was somewhat tight quarters and we had to climb quite a few stairs to get up to the apartment, it was the perfect location for us to stay the night. For dinner, we went down to a restaurant overlooking the water so that we could see the sunset during dinner and ordered some pasta with seafood (yum!). That, followed by gelato and a bottle of wine, put us to sleep relatively early that night.
We woke early the next morning to get a start on the day ahead. Once we finally made it to Monterosso to begin the trail, we had high hopes for the adventure ahead. Already the views were incredible and we weren't even on the trail yet! The travel guides were right though, the trail from Monterosso to Vernazza was a legitimate hike. We climbed God knows how many stairs made of jagged rocks, uneven terrain, and walked along paths that were, at most, a foot wide with a steep fall if you took one misstep. Naturally, it was inevitable with my gracefulness that I would be the one to take that one misstep. So we were walking along - maybe about 45 minutes into the hike - and my friend, Val, heard a lizard in the bushes. Of course I was curious, so I tried looking for it with her. However, I somehow forgot the fact that I had absolutely no room to move or else I was going to fall off the side of this cliff into a bunch of brush. I cannot remember how far down I would have fallen (I don't think this particular section was that steep), but I was definitely hanging on for dear life while my friends lent out a helping hand to pull me up... Yes, I am probably exaggerating a little but it was pretty scary there for a minute. I think my camera got the brunt of it as my screen is now full of
scratches. Luckily, I came away with only a few scrapes on my hands and some shaky knees, but I hopped back up, dusted myself off, and we kept on walking.
After about an hour and a half of walking we had finally made it to the second town, Vernazza. This was definitely my favorite town of the five. We decided to stop there to grab lunch (huge container of sensational spaghetti for 5 euro!) and sit on a bench along the water to eat it. We then continued our hike, and after about 5 hours total of hiking we made it back to Riomaggiore. The pictures that I have from that day do not even begin to show how incredible it was to be there. Despite the few scrapes and little bit of sunburn, Cinque Terre has been put at the top of my list of favorite places I have ever been to!
Now it's the end of the day, and we are on our way to Florence...
