Hiking across Cinque Terre

During my travel across Europe, I made brilliant memories. I fell in love with Paris the minute I met her, I was lost in the psychedelic world in Amsterdam, I was mesmerized by the beauty of Switzerland and enjoyed everything Italian. But one experience, which I felt was not quite popular than the aforementioned is what I am going to talk about- Cinque Terre.

The word ‘Cinque Terre’ in Italian means, Five Lands. Cinque Terre consists of five villages along the Ligurian coast of Italy. 10 days before departure to Paris, my cousin and I were still split between visiting the Amalfi coast and Cinque Terre. We chose the latter, a decision I really am glad about.

The five coastal villages of Cinque Terre are, Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza and Monterosso al Mare. The hike path between Monterosso and Riomaggiore is about 13 kilometres which can be covered in about 5.5-6 hours. But the beauty of Cinque Terre villages is their train connectivity. Each village has a railway station and for every half an hour, there is a train to both La Spezia and Levanto on either direction. All the train takes is just 14 minutes.

With all this in mind, we walked out of the café in La Spezia railway station. La Spezia is quite an interesting place. Though Italian, a glance from the bathroom of my 3rd floor room showed me beautiful roofs and somehow, it felt very much like Spain. As we walked towards the ticket counter, we saw a little board saying, ‘Cinque Terre passes available here’ in a bunch of languages. We walked in and came out 10 minutes later with a pass and a hard copy of the timetable each.

This pass cost us about 7.5€ which was valid for a day (un giorno- flaunting my little Italian skills). The benefits were quite eye catching- unlimited train travel between the Cinque Terre villages, entry into the hike path (which is a national park) and the use of buses between the villages, apart from the unlimited wifi access. That was quite a good deal when I made a mental calculation of the euros we’d have to spend.

The train arrived on time which whisked us past all the villages. The interesting part was the train was completely under a tunnel which was drilled through the mountains along the coast. At every station, one would see the sea towards one side and as the train would recede into the mountain, it would turn dark again. People were in bathing suits, busy applying their sun screen lotions. I could tell that they were all in for a good tan.

About 20 minutes later, we disembarked at Monterosso al Mare, the farthest of villages from where we were camping (La Spezia). As we walked into the village, we could hear the sea from our left hand side and hence walked down the only road in the village. There, it was…

We were welcomed by a brilliant blue of sea and sky together. It was quite humid but nothing new for someone who was brought up in Chennai. Monterosso was the only village that had a beach. It was quite crowded. The colourful orange umbrellas and even more colourful people in their swim suits and bikinis were walking about taking a dip or reading a book.

The promenade was adorned by little cafes and gelatarias that I could not resist my temptation to get a gelato. We did in the end, taking a seat on the tables along on the promenade staring into the blue of the sea. The sun was beating down on us and soon, I made a mess of my cone. The gelato began dripping all around my hand which I shamelessly licked away. Come on, it is gelato!

We walked around the little village of Monterosso awed by the quaintness and also at the same time, the colourfulness. After strolling around aimlessly for an hour, we decided to begin the hike.

One had to be mentally strong to begin a hike at about 2 PM afternoon with the sun beating down on a summer day in a coastal place- yes, that’s the worst combination you can come up with. We were too excited to think about the sun or the coastal humidity. Passion was driving me, a force that is strong enough to annihilate every obstacle. The way to Vernazza began like this.

We hiked, hiked and hiked- through the forests, through the vine yards, along the coast and by the sea, mountain after mountain. We met people occasionally who’d greet us and ask how long to reach Monterosso. It looked like we were the only people hiking backwards. What I had read on the internet helped us take this decision which, at the end of the day we were happy for. The reason for the backward hike was because the path between Monterosso and Vernazza is the steepest and the most difficult phase. Hence, we decided to get that out of the way first. Some light reading on the internet helps, you know!

We trekked kilometres along the coast. It was just breathtaking. The forest was not quite dense but we were always within the coast’s view. The expanding blue covered the entire eye site.

Afar, we could see we were close to a village. But it just took us another 45 minutes before the picture postcard view of Vernazza came into the fray. The internet went crazy about how one would feel reaching Vernazza from Monterosso and I had to agree that it was right. The 1 hour 45 minutes trek had finally taken us to Vernazza.

We trekked down into the village and the path that led us into the village and down to the sea looked like we were trespassing through private property. The paths looked like this.

We walked down and joined a busy lane with closely built houses. As we passed a pizzeria, we could not control our hunger for the smell was too inviting. The nice little lady served us square pizzas each and we went in search of a place to eat. Vernazza had a secret beach which was almost hidden away inside a cave. Luckily, we found a spot and perched on a stone wall by the side of the sea, munching on the delicious pizzas which were topped with generous amount of cheese. After calming down the stomach, we walked down the coast and settled down by the side of the long quay. The colourful buildings and hills beyond them was a sight to savour, not to forget the pretty bikini women.

A half an hour’s rest later, we decided we were both fit enough to resume the trek. We had trekked about 3 kilometres and had about 4 kilometres to the next destination, Corniglia. For most part of the trek, we were able to see the village of Corniglia. This is because Corniglia was the only Cinque Terre village which was situated on the hill and not by the sea itself.

The path between Vernazza and Corniglia was quite steady and flat for most parts and hence, the stress was considerably less. By the time we reached Corniglia through the vineyards, it was about 8 PM. I was incredibly hungry again. As we sat by the village center, observing the activity, the tired legs began recuperating. What tired me more was my bag with water, a few napkins and the heavy camera with its accessories. We planned on dinner and took a table at a restaurant by the side of the village center. It was quite a weird restaurant and I would always remember it for it charged us for the ‘table.’ Yes, I was charged for the table I sat on in the restaurant. I wondered, after paying the bill, if the table was eatable.

But having said that, the restaurant had served me one of the best pizzas I had eaten in Italy and France that summer. The sheer presentation won my heart. Fortunately, my cousin Deepak took a snap of it.

The long summer days were quite a weird phenomenon when I had first come across it in Paris. I kept telling Deepak that it had become 9.30 PM and we were still able to see sunlight. I thanked the long day since we had two more villages to visit. My miscalculation cost me a train and hence, we spent an hour dining and walking down the incredibly huge number of staircases down to the coast to the train station. I told myself that here I am in Italy, walking down the stairs which was built to reach a hill top. Who the heck builds a staircase to a hill? The Italians!

The train when it came whisked us immediately to Manarola. We were forced to take a train since the paths between Corniglia & Manarola and Manarola & Riomaggiore (the via del amore) were closed. Manarola was supposed to be one of the prettiest villages in Cinque Terre. It began like every other village, sliding down to the sea but there was something special about it, the rocks. They added an extra element to the overall complexion of images. The night time images were incredible even though I did not possess a tripod.

We spent about an hour in Manarola exploring it before calling it quits. I badly wanted to visit Riomaggiore. How could I not visit one of the five villages? That would have been a blasphemy. It was indeed but we could do nothing about it. That was the last train we had to catch to reach La Spezia. With a morose face, I walked into the train as it headed in the direction of La Spezia Centrale. I was quite inconsolable when I went to bed. It had been a splendid day but for missing out on Riomaggiore.

I’ll tell you this, the universe works in weird ways so much so that most times you haven’t even thought about the existence of that possibility. A few hours of extra sleep the next morning and a missed train to Rome saw us at La Speiza Centrale once again with about 2.5 hours to kill. The decision was a no-brainer. We took the next train towards Levanto and reached Riomaggiore. I was ecstatic.

Riomaggiore was also situated on the hills but it had a coastal connection. The streets were longer and wider and looked as big as Monterosso. The huge avenue led us down to the coast. This avenue was packed with restaurants selling delicious breakfast of freshly made croissants and pizzas, not to forget the coffee. It was just incredible walking by and observing people. It is fascinating to note how we get to feel when we are in a happy environment; it is as though the vibration of the place is just remarkably good. Riomaggiore was one of those places that fine morning.

Riomaggiore, unlike other Cinque Terre villages had a lot more streets and hence we took some time exploring it completely. We did not head down to the sea partially because we had seen enough of it and partially because I had replaced my all terrain shoes with a pair of sneakers. Walking up to one of the top most points in the village, we turned around and came to this vista.

As we walked back to the train station, I reflected on the unique experience we had gone through. Cinque Terre, unlike Positano and Amalfi was not all about the glitz and glamour. It had a raw edge to it, a thrill in conquering the hike path and quite a lot of ruggedness. Cinque Terre was also about cafes, lazy dinings and leisurely beach time. We got down at La Speiza, crossed the road, picked up our luggage and were in time to catch the Frecciarossa to Roma. It was the last leg of our travel across Europe. The train started as I bid goodbye to La Speiza. Rome was beckoning…