Cinque Terra National Park

Postcard perfect Vernazza
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Using the town of La Spezia as our accomodation base, we caught the train to the southern end of the five coastal villages known as the Cinque Terra. From south to north the villages were called Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza and Monterosso. All now connected by train, the villages were once only accessible by boat or on foot. The coastal walking trail that connects the five villages is what we had come to see. It takes approximately five hours to walk the entire 9km route, so makes a great day trip.

Spectacular coastal scenery from the start
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The track started out relatively easily, with the southern three villages all within the first 4km. The spectacular scenery rivalled what we had seen on the Amalfi Coast. Steep cliffs and green gullies tumbled down to a sparkling azure sea. The villages are built on isolated outcrops of rock and have gorgeous little fishing harbours and swimming beaches.

scenery to rival the Amalfi Coast

We had a lunch break at Corniglia, then tackled the more difficult northern half of the trail. There had been plenty of trails leading down to the shore along the first three sections of the trail, but we didn’t go for a swim until we reached Vernazza, since the track headed away from the shore for a while. We were in dire need of cooling off by this stage since the temperature was in the mid-thirties and parts of the trail offered little shade. After a couple of hours of relaxing and swimming at the rocks at the base of the cliff that Vernazza sits on, we were ready to press on to the final village.

Manarola with its tiny fishing port
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The northernmost section between Vernazza and Monterosso was by far the hardest part of the trail and took us around two hours. The track climbs up the steep cliffs using hundreds of steps winding through the ancient vineyards and orchards. We were sweating up a storm by the time it levelled off and began to descend towards Monterosso in the early evening.

A twilight swim at one of the town’s fantastic sandy beaches and we were ravenous. There were plenty of trattorias to choose from along the water front, but we found a cheaper option away from the tourists just off the town square. Being a Saturday night, we just had to check out a few of the trendy wine bars afterwards and sampled a few more excellent chiantis.

Slogging our way up the hill towards the last village
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We loved Monterosso so much that we found ourselves back there again the next day (this time catching the train from La Spezia) spending a lazy day on one of the private beaches. If you arrive after 2:30pm the price for a couple of loungers and a sun umbrella was a lot cheaper. The water was so warm during the middle of the day that it hardly cooled you off at all.