Tuesday – 19 June 2018
If you were wondering about the term used in the title – depending on your politics – please note that it has nothing whatsoever to do with politics… but let me explain. On December 31, 1974, Leonard Cohen (bless his soul) released an album, those days on vinyl, titled The Best Of.

On the back cover he gave a succinct background description to each song which I always found rather fascinating to read. Yes, I read it multiple times. He also gave an explanation of the album cover where he cuts a rather dashing figure, I thought. He thought so too but was not that vain to assume everybody would share his sentiments. The description of the front cover photo was thus “This was taken in the mirror of a hotel room in Milan by Pino. I rarely ever look this good, or bad, depending on your politics” I always loved this phrase.

 

 

And by the way, if you don’t have this specific album in your music collection, it is incomplete.

Be as it may, for as long as I can remember I have wanted to “do” the Cinque Terre (pronounced chink-where terror). Come to think of it, it was actually since 1998 when I attended an SMDG (Ship Message Design Group) meeting that was held in La Spezia. I remember being told by the porter that the Cinque Terre bottle of wine gift in the room was very special. The Cinque Terre is a small mountainous region north of La Spezia and it is against and amongst these mountains that the grapes are grown for their special wines. But I never did get the chance then to visit the region.

Directly translated Cinque Terre means five lands, but in medieval times, terre referred to a town or village rather than land. So, Cinque Terre actually means five towns and this much better describes the region which is made up of five terribly photogenic towns.

Starting from south to north, the nearest to La Spezia is Riomaggiore, then just to the north along the coast you will find Manarola, then follows Corniglia, the only town of the five that do not have a harbour and is situated high up on the mountain. The next town you will find is Vernazza and last but not least you will find Monterosso al Mare which is situated just south of the seaside town of Levanto.

The towns are pretty much evenly spread out about 2km apart from each other with Manarola and Riomaggiore only about 1km apart. In 1999 the Italian government declared the Cinque Terre a national park and at 3860 hectares it is the smallest park in Italy, and is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There is a vast network of footpaths or trails that cover this entire area, naturally with amazing views all around and down towards the ocean.

https://www.google.com/maps/@44.1152033,9.7602095,12z

The main reason we chose to stay in the small hilltop village of Ponzano Superiore is due its close proximity to the Cinque Terre and today we finally decided to do the deed. It was early morning when we got up; it was late morning when we left. We climbed aboard our train in Santo Stefano to La Spezia, the main launch pad for a trip to the Cinque Terre. Twenty minutes later we arrived at the central station where it was bedlam, one had to step lively not to be trampled to within an inch of your life. There were many languages that I could distinguish but the overwhelming flavour was American, I hardly heard any English.

We found the Cinque Terre tourist office and the queue out there was something I did not expect, although I should have. While Adri held onto our place in the queue I walked around the station and found another office with a petite queue. There we bought a Cinque Terre card that gives one access to the trails throughout the park, unlimited train travel and bus travel, free guided visits, free wifi, free toilets etc. For €16 per person per day this is well worth it, taking into account that train journeys between the towns would set you back €4 each.

After validating our card in the validation machine on the platform we climbed aboard a very heavily laden train, at that point there was standing room only. At the first stop of Riomaggiore a truckload of people got off and we were happy to be comfortably seated. Having seen the masses of people disembarking here it seemed like most people do the Cinque Terre from south to north, so we decided to do it the opposite way, going against the traffic so to speak. We also decided to take the train all the way to Levanto above the Cinque Terre’s starting point, just to make sure we did not miss anything.

We strolled around Levanto which has a charm of its own, but it was not the Cinque Terre, so we walked around only a short while before heading back to the station, planning to catch the 12:35 train. We almost made it; we were exactly 30 seconds late and saw our transport disappear before our very eyes.

 

 

We wasted 30 minutes drinking an espresso waiting for the next train to appear. We had to plan our visits to each town carefully; we had limited time as we needed to be back in La Spezia by 21:00 as the last train to Santo Stefano for the day leaves at 21:15.

 

 

 

 

We arrived in Monterosso al Mare, one could smell holiday in the air as the perfumed fumes from an array of suntan lotions in use on the bodies below rose up to the promenade above… just wonderful. We strolled around the little shops and restaurants which were fully occupied, business was brisk.

We walked south along the coast, round a little headland and came to the other part of Monterosso al Mare, quieter but still lots of fun to be had on that beach.

 

When you go to the Cinque Terre you have to walk at least one trail between the towns to get a feel for the nature of the surrounding area. Unfortunately, due to repairs, the coastal trails between Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore were closed, so we decided to do the one between Monterosso al Mare and Vernazza.

And so it was that we headed south from Monterosso al Mare at around 13:45 on foot along the coast into the wilderness and beyond. The sea, far down below, is almost always in sight with mountains, vineyards, trees and bush that make up the rest of your view. The little footpath – sometimes so narrow that you have to wait for people to pass from the opposite end – has steps up and up which are mostly carved into the rock. The vistas are splendid; the eyes never get enough.

The legs however did get enough. We were walking at the hottest time of the day – it was 30°C plus plus – but it was not by choice, but by a “pressing” schedule. Adri had a small bottle of water with her but alas, that was not enough and disappeared long before we reached the halfway mark. The sun was beating the crap out of us while the path continued up and up. We finally caught a quick glimpse of Vernazza far below. Relieved we thought we would now start the descent, but we would be horribly wrong, that path somehow continued going up into the heavens above.

Adri was feeling faint, kapping (hitting) low blood pressure from time to time, it was hot… very hot, we still had no water. The only thing that kept me from fainting was the thought of Adri fainting, and of course the thought of what was lying in wait for me at the end of this trail… an ice cold one. It took us some two hours to finish the trail of around 3.5km, but hell, it was worth every drop of sweat and fainting thought.

 

 

And then we suddenly started to descent and before too long Vernazza came into sight proper, right below us, and what a sight it was for sore eyes and feet. Just then we came upon a Dutch couple taking picture after picture, and a drink. I took a picture; I had no drink, remember, but commented “pragtig” (beautiful/magnificent). They replied in unison “prachtig, ja… prachtig”.

 

 

We wearily entered Vernazza at around 15:30 and what a beautiful town this turned out to be. But, for now there was no time to walk around idly, we needed water, but more importantly, I needed beer. We located a small supermarket amongst the throng of tourists where we found the requisite. An icy cold water for Adri and an icy cold Birra Moretti, the 660ml kind, for me.

We sat ourselves down on some ancient steps and watched the world go by as we caught our breath after that short but steep walk, nursing our respective drinks. There is a saying in Afrikaans, used when you are very tired and about to take a rest that goes “Sit poephol, rus bene hang ballas… baas moeg” (Sit backside, rest legs, hang balls… boss tired). And these are the words that escaped my mouth before replacing it with that gloriously golden Moretti.

 

 

 

 

Adri needed more sustenance and got herself a gelato from the Gelateria Vernazza across the way, one scoop of Belgian chocolate and one of Ricotta cheesecake and figs. The latter was particularly amazing.

After recuperating sufficiently we walked around this extraordinary little town, down to the waterfront and around. Vernazza quickly stole my heart; to me it is truly the jewel in the crown of the Cinque Terre, it really is very special, my favourite.

 

It was by now 16:30 and we had to get a move on, we still had three towns to visit. While waiting for our train we sat next to a young Chinese girl who seemed to be fast asleep, I knew how she felt. It was a few minutes later when there was a commotion next to us, the girl was in fact fast asleep and had toppled over, nearly crashing to the floor. She gave me a sheepish shrug and continued to laugh uncontrollably at herself. She decided to rather stand while waiting for the train. What a charming girl.

A couple of minutes’ train ride further we emerged at the Corniglia station, it was around 17:00, but we saw no Corniglia, it was situated way up on the hill, or mountain… depending on your politics. My politics said it was a mountain, and the stairs to get there went up and up and up, all of the 33 flights consisting of 382 steps. We could of course have waited for the shuttle bus… but by now we were masochists, we needed the pain.

 

 

We finally reached the top and entered Corniglia which is the only one of the five towns that is not situated at sea level. We walked amongst the wonderful old town with beautiful views down to the sea far below. Adri visited the church, not sure where she got the energy from, I just sat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was 17:30, there was a train at 17:50, we needed to get that one, else we would have to wait and waste some 30 minutes. We started the trek back and I was surprised to see a scarf – that seemed identical to the one Adri had – draped around the rear-view mirror of a little red Italian sports car. And just at that moment Adri cried out from behind me that she had lost her scarf. I’ll let you draw your own conclusion to this story…

 

 

All the way down the 382 steps – we could have taken the bus of course – and we were just in time for our 17:50 which took us to Manarola. We took a stroll through town and ended up at the waterfront. From there we took a stroll along the pathway that leads up to the opposite side of town from where one gets wonderful photo opportunities.

By now we were hungry as wolves but decided to suppress those hunger pangs for just a tad longer, we would have supper in our last of the Cinque Terre towns, in Riomaggiore.

From the train station in Riomaggiore you walk along a long pedestrian tunnel to reach the town. Where the tunnel ends one can either go right and down to the waterfront or left into town. We chose the latter first to check our options for supper, there were numerous.

 

 

 

 

We then backtracked and took a stroll down to the lovely waterfront but did not linger, supper was waiting. Finding a restaurant to settle down in was not easy, they all looked great, but we finally decided on the Il Maggiore Cafe/Restaurant, the food on the plates of the patrons looked great.

 

 

 

My first item on order was a large 660ml Heineken per favour (please), followed by the two pizzas which were of lesser importance. The waiters, the service and the food were all great; we would surely come back here should we find ourselves stranded in this town again. How amazing it was to finally sit down and relax and consolidate the overload of images, sounds and scenes of the day.

 

 

After supper we had just enough time to get back to La Spezia and catch the last train to Santo Stefano for the day, at 21:15. The ticket machine in La Spezia was uncooperative; it did not recognise my town. And of course by now the human ticket office was closed. Drat. I tried and tried in vain, but I could not will that machine into displaying my intended destination. Maybe there were no more trains there tonight? Perish the thought!

I finally saw a station worker disappear into an office and followed him there and explained my predicament. In perfect English he assured me there was indeed still one train and that it was just a quirk of the system. You see, Santo is abbreviated by an “S”, followed by a “.” Followed by a space, before the “S” of Stefano”. Keying in “S. Stefano” brought the expected result and I arrived with our tickets on the platform as the train pulled up. Whew!

Not sure how the car drove itself up the mountain from “S. Stefano” to Ponzano Superiore, but somehow we managed to get home alive.

So, this is how we “did” the Cinque Terre in just one day but you probably need at least two and preferably three days or more to spend time amongst these beautiful towns and mountains and walking trails. But for now, we were happy to have experienced all that we had… happy and tired!

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