Cinque Terre – New Characters and First Adventures

For those of you who don’t know, Cinque Terre (CHINK-weh TAY-reh) is actually made up of five cities along the western coast of northern Italy (cinque means five in Italian). Each city is only a few minutes train ride from the next and at a little over one euro, one ticket is good for six hours worth of rides. Thus, no matter which cittá you are staying in, you have every opportunity to explore all five. Our first night the girls were booked at a little B&B in Manarola (the second of the five cities). I planned on staying in the local hostel, but decided to see them all checked-in before finding my accommodations.

After a key-breaking-in-the-lock fiasco and an authentic Italian dinner, I ended up staying the night with the girls. As it turned out the hostel had a 12:00am locked doors policy and the waiter at dinner had asked us all to come back for drinks at 11:30pm, how could we pass that up?
During dinner we met the greatest little family from Tampa Bay, Florida sitting at the table just next to ours (husband and wife, son and girlfriend). They were in Italy for a friend’s wedding in Florence next week and were enjoying the Cinque Terre in the mean time. We traded some tastes with them (anchovies for black pasta – yum!) and chatted the evening away across our tables.

Once 11:30 rolled around we headed back to the restaurant for a bottle of wine and some dessert with our waiter and the cook – who turned out to be the owners. We sat and enjoyed the quiet stillness of the evening from the terrace. They spoke very good English and we learned they had lived in Manarola their whole lives and wouldn’t trade it for anything. After a peaceful evening like that, I can hardly blame them. End of CT Day 1.

The girls decided to stay an extra night and we headed to Vernazza to try and find new accommodations (city #4 – which was supposed to be a little more lively). Since I needed the practice, I was in charge of finding a place. But it was raining that morning and we didn’t have much success (plus we were toting ALL our belongings from place to place) and I hadn’t had breakfast yet….do you see where this is going? As if I didn’t already know, I (re)learned something important about myself: Do not try to make difficult decisions on an empty stomach. Right. So a few tears later we settled on staying in Corniglia and hopped back on the train. (In the mean time we met a gal named Erin who was traveling alone and looking for dinner companions – yay for new friends!)

Once we checked in, we got on the train again and spent the day wandering through the Cinque Terre. The weather cleared up and it turned out to be a gorgeous day. We walked through the towns, did a little shopping, stopped quite a bit to enjoy the view, and generally just enjoyed the day. We tried to meet our new friend Erin for dinner, but didn’t make it to the meeting spot on time. We did find her a few hours later at one of the bars and had a glass of wine together. Since the girls were leaving the next morning, Erin and I made plans to have dinner the following day. End of CT Day 2