We visited this place because we had some extra time and one of Ryan’s friends highly recommended it. It’s basically 5 little towns, each one a preserve and maintained by volunteers. You take a train in to the first city and then you bought a pass to walk and or ride a train to each individual city. We attempted to walk, but after about 2 miles of walking along the coast, we discovered that it was blocked off. When we got back we found a sign that we think was a warning about this closer. If we spoke Italian a little better we might have caught this. From there we had 2 choices to get to the next town, Wait for 45 minutes for the next train, which took 3 minutes to get to the next town, or walk about 4 miles up the mountain side and about 5 miles down the other. Guess which one we chose…..that’s right. So when we started the hike we could see the town, but the path doesn’t just connect the 2 towns, it first takes you to the top of the hill where there is an even smaller town, and then takes you across the ridge and down the other side. None of us were prepared for this and my parents are pushing 60. Needless to say, it sucked. But the sites we saw made it almost worth it. Having eating up about 4 hours of our day, we were very happy to reach the next town. We had a small meal and walked around for a bit, then got on the next train going to the next city. There we watched the waves crashing into the walls and caught a really nice sunset. We moved on to the next town for a few minutes. There we had some hot chocolate. Hot chocolate in real Italian cafes weren’t chocolate flavored powder mixed into hot water. These were more like 5 chocolate bars melted into a glass, with sugar added and whipped cream on top. It stuck to our spoons like pudding. VERY rich, I have never said that about another desert in my life. I could only eat half of it. We caught the next train back to Rome and my little brothers started to get sick. We think it MIGHT have been from the 5 chocolate bars he just drank because all he threw up was black goo. We got back and my parents and I stopped for a small dinner but my brothers passed out right away
The next day was rainy and grey and my little brother was still sick. We walked around all morning, not really doing much. Around lunch time I started to get sick and wasn’t really worth much. We had given our bags to the hotel and I hadn’t dressed for the weather we were experiencing. Cold and sick, we continued to walk around the town. Our train to Switzerland wasn’t leaving until 10pm so we were finding warm ways to kill time. We finally found a book store and sat down to get warm. I was in the bathroom puking up until it was time to go get our bags and head for the train station. The train was a “sleeper†train. Each cabin had 6 beds and after everyone got settled we slept until about 7am. The following morning we found out that our 6th bed as taken by a nuclear physicist from CERN. FREAKING CERN. Now if you don’t know what CERN is, they are basically the leading research facility in nuclear physics, have he largest particle accelerator, and dabble in things such as figuring out the creation of the universe. Just minor things like that.
Next stop is Port De Solie, Switzerland
0 Responses to “Cinque Terra, Italy.”