Semana Santa Part 1: Cinque Terre

Friday, March 26th

On Friday morning I awoke bright and early to catch my cab. (Scratch bright; it was still pitch black, actually). My cab arrived at 4:30am, being as it was the middle of the night I made it to the airport in less than 15 minutes. But crazy was I to think that just because it was still the middle of the night and Spaniards don’t seem to like to “madrugarse” that the airport wouldn’t be crowded. After all, even when I travel on Thursday and Friday at late morning or early afternoon times, I barely waste time in lines, and definitely not in security. But welcome to Semana Santa; the place was packed. I of course was flying Ryanair, the most dirt-cheap budget airline of them all, so it was of course situated in the least convenient location. I stood in line for about 35 minutes just to check my bag through but had to go to yet a different desk to get my travel documents approved because I am not an EU citizen (horror of horrors), which involved a couple more useless minutes. (Because, of course, it wouldn’t make sense for ALL the check-in desks to have the official document seal/stamp/what have you. That would be far too logical.) So, then I have to run all the way back to security, which for the first time ever actually resembles more of a EWR line than anything I have seen here. So I go through that… make it through by 5:35. [Note: my boarding time is 5:30; the plane is set to depart the gate at 6am. Note also: the previous statement about Ryanair being the cheapest and therefore most inconvenient airline ever]. As you can guess, the gate couldn’t possibly be anywhere close to the security check. So walking very fast for ten minutes I reach my gate, which is already mostly boarded, and I’ve broken a sweat, and it’s still barely light outside. Excellent. Now for some much needed sleep; no wait – the seats don’t recline and they make announcements every 15 minutes! Whoopee! Anyway, the rest of the travel was smooth, made all the necessary connections, and met Elise at Milano Centrale. Unfortunately we didn’t have seats together on the 3-hour train to Cinque Terre, but that was fine. Once we made it to La Spezia, one of the towns close to where we were staying in Cinque Terre, we had a little trouble with the train schedule, but we finally made it onto the correct train. (And then the conductor came by to check our tickets and told me it was a 50€ fine for not stamping my ticket. Luckily I was able to explain that I had had no idea and I avoided it – because the first stop was mine – but seriously, what a terrible system! A. How am I supposed to know to stamp it if no one has told me and there are no signs? B. What is the point? I’m already holding the ticket. Can’t they just print the time/date on the ticket itself?? Oh, Italy). Our hostel was nice but extremely cold!

Saturday, March 27th

On Saturday Elise and I slept in a bit and then got breakfast (Latte and omelets!) in our beautiful little town. (Which is literally one long street up an extremely steep hill.) The houses are old and a bit crumbling but all in bright colors. This town has no water access – it’s built on cliffs.) We began the hike through all the 5 towns. The first two connections were supposed to be easy and short, basically strolls, and then next two more intense. We were unsure whether the third or fourth was technically the most difficult (my online guide said the middle one, as did Elise’s mom’s memory; Elise’s guidebook and the km to average time to complete chart on our map said the fourth). We weren’t actually able to come to our own conclusion because the last trail was closed due to a landslide. It was a little gray, but the hikes and views were excellent. The first was a half mile on a paved walk way – part of it through the tunnel of love, with graffiti and murals inside and pad locks adorning the railings as a symbol of couples “locking in” their love. It overlooks the ocean the entire way. This path brought us to Manarola, a town also situated on cliffs and even smaller and unobtrusive than Riomaggiore (the town in which we stayed). On to Corniglia – the second hike was more on a nature path, but still fairly easy. Some older Italian women were walking it in heeled boots. Corniglia was also beautiful; each town is similar but has it’s own characteristics. This town was slightly bigger, and there were small twisting streets filled with pizzerias and foccacerias and a big tower at the top of the hill that we could climb and see the entire town below and the cliffs and oceans. Then we started the long climb (it ended up taking us about 80 minutes, although we stopped for a snack at one point and stopped many times to take pictures). This one was indeed harder, with lots of ups and downs, less old ladies in heels – less, not none – and paths through olive groves. Eventually we descended down down down into Vernazza. This was probably the biggest town yet, and still beautiful, and the first one on the water. There were lots of ocean-side restaurants and pizzerias and souvenir shops. We spent quite a while there before catching a train to Monterosso, the last and largest of the towns. We arrived in Monterosso around 5p and it definitely has a different feel from the others. First, there was much more beach. Second, there was a parking lot full of RVs. At first we couldn’t figure out what was so special about this town, we walked up and down the street and frankly didn’t see much of anything. Eventually, though, we realized there was a whole other section around a bend that we couldn’t see, and this led into restaurant/hostel/bar area. It was cute, but it actually took us a while to find a place we deemed suitable for dinner. We finally found one – and I had a steaming plate of penne with spicy tomato sauce and shrimps. Although I would have preferred my shrimps to be shelled for me! It was quite a chore. Mostly it was delicious because we were absolutely freezing. In fact, after we took a train back to our town (the warmest part yet), we stopped at a bar on the way up the hill to our hostel to get some steaming tea and hot chocolate.) Not much of a night life here…

Sunday, March 28th

Today we woke up a bit earlier – 8:30am. Actually, it was 9:30, but we had forgotten about the time change. We checked out of our hostel and I checked into my new hotel/hostel even further up the steep hill. Then we went to the train to take it to Monterosso where we planned on spending some time until Elise had to catch her train at one. It was on the train that Elise remembered the time change. We spent some time wondering about it, and asking our Canadian seat neighbors, who had no idea what we were talking about. Turns out she was right though, so we only had about an hour or so before she had to catch her train home, so we got an early lunch. (This time I got vegetable stuffed pasta in a cream/cheese “nut sauce”). Since it was finally absolutely gorgeous and sunny, I went back to Riomaggiore to get my swimsuit and book so I could lay out on the beach. The trains don’t run extremely often though, so in the time it took me to go back, change, and catch another train, an hour and 15 minutes had past and the sky was more hazy. I still spent the afternoon reading on the beach however. (And getting a hazelnut gelato!) Around 5:30 it started getting cold though so I have returned to my hotel to decompress, get some warmer clothes, and hang out before going in search of food.
This is definitely the type of place that you can be in and out of in a little over 24 hours – unless it’s summer and you have all the swimming/sunning/boating opportunities. I plan on having another lazy morning tomorrow – my train tomorrow is at 2:15, and I’m hoping that I will have an easy connection with the rest of my group when I finally reach Venice at 9:30 tomorrow night!