Today we tackled the 11km trek along all five towns of the Cinque Terre. The trail starts out deceivingly easy with the flat-paved lovers’ walk to Manarola and the relatively simple path to Corniglia. From there, things get very hilly very fast. The path to Vernazza is long, steep, and features a frustrating series of inclines followed by declines followed by inclines again. The views throughout, however, are spectacular – the area is a national park and we would go long stretches without seeing any buildings, only trees and the sea (the only sign of development being hoses of water used to irrigate the occasional terraced vineyard).
In Vernazza, we stopped for a simple lunch of breach, cheese, eggs, and fruit that we had carried with us – plus cones of gelato that we couldn’t resist buying. The last portion of the hike from Vernazza to Monterosso starts with hundreds of stairs leading up into the hills. After this incline, and some additional challenging terrain, we made our slow and long-awaited descent into town. Once there, we dangled our tired feet over a ledge by the beach and treated ourselves to some cooling drinks at a bar perched over the harbor (Fanta for Claire). Exhausted but proud of our feat, we took the boat back to Riomaggiore. Bill took in the views from bow, while Claire napped on a bench in the cabin. We cooked a nice dinner of fresh ravioli (for which we had searched for days) and called it an early night.
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