CINQUE TERRE, Italy
Cinque
Terre “five lands”, surrounded by five
picturesque town, colorful villages, coastlines, fishing boats, wine, and
famous for the hiking trails that connect the five towns. The five towns are Riomaggiore,
Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and Monterosso.
I traveled there during early May in 2017, where it
was late spring or early summer, the weather was just perfect to walk around,
not too hot and not too cold.
How
to Get There
The best way travel to Cinque Terre is by
train. The nearest city to Cinque Terre is La Spezia. I travel from Milano
Centrale to La Spezia by train, and it took 3 hours to arrive La Spezia. From
La Spezia, there is a local train departed every 30 minutes or 1 hour to Cinque
Terre. The travel time between La Spezia and the first town Riomaggiore is 15
minutes. The ticket can be bought directly at the ticket counter.
Travel
around Cinque Terre
Since you can’t drive into the center of
the towns, it is much easier to travel around Cinque Terre by train. If you
drive, it is better to park your car in La Spezia, and took train to travel
around the five villages.
From La Spezia, you can travel to all five
villages in 1 day. It is highly recommended to buy a Cinque Terre
Card from the main station in La Spezia
with only EUR 16 and allowed you to travel unlimited to all five towns in 1
day. The ticket cannot be purchase online, but you can buy easily at any ticket
locket in the railway station in La Spezia and Cinque Terre. The ticket lockets
open at 7.30 AM. There are ticket machines in any of the train station, you can
still buy one way ticket to any town in Cinque Terre. But if you want to buy
Cinque Terre card, you need to buy it at the ticket locket.
Note: Do not forget to get the stamp to validate your ticket before you board the train or you may get
fine of EUR 50. Tickets can be validated at the train stations and platform.
The ticket validation is valid for 75 minutes.
The nearest Cinque Terre town from La
Spezia is Riomaggiore, followed by Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and
Monterosso. You can start travelling from Riomaggiore all the way to Monterosso
or vice versa.
Where
to Stay?
I rented an apartment in La Spezia from airbnb. We choose to stay overnight at La Spezia
due to the accommodation price in La Spezia is much cheaper comparing with
Cinque Terre. Besides that, travel between La Spezia and Cinque Terre is very
convenience.
La Spezia
We arrived La Spezia in late afternoon, we
checked in our airbnb and walk around the town. It is a small town and surrounded
by few restaurants.
La Spezia is quite a layback town. The elevator
was so oldish that we need to hold the button to go up or down. If we unhold
the button, the lift will stop. Sounds scary huh! At first we failed to figure
out on how to use the lift since there was no English instruction. Lucky there
was one security guard walked by and guided us on how to use the lift.
Again, I was impressed with the foods in
Italy. We read the reviews from Tripadvisor before going in any restaurants. We
found one restaurant with very good reviews in Tripadvisor and indeed the foods
were so delicious. The restaurant name is “Pulcinella”. We asked the restaurant’s staff for the recommended foods
and we just ordered based on what they recommend.
Not just the foods were delicious, but the
staffs were very good looking <3 <3
After dinner, we went back to our Airbnb
and had early rest since we were planning to catch sunrise at Monterosso in the
next morning.
Monterosso
We woke up early at 5 am to catch sunrise
in the next morning. Too bad it was raining when we arrived Monterosso. There
was no sunrise, it was raining and so cold, all the shops were yet open, the
next train was in the next 1 hour. So we could only walk around with our
umbrella and wait till the shop open to get the breakfast. One thing that I
hate during travel is walking under the rain (T.T). Well, we checked the weather
before but sometimes still cannot avoid mistake.
My impression towards Monterosso was more
to a ghost town. Since we arrived there too early + the raining weather, the
town was so quite. Only me and Alda were walking in the street.
Not much picture taken in Monterosso due to
raining weather. Well, I was quite sad since we were unable to catch the
sunrise + annoying raining weather, so I was not in a good mood to take
pictures.
After walking around Monteresso for 1 hour,
we were heading back to the train station to take another train to
Vernazza.
Vernazza
The weather became much better once we
arrived Vernazza. Thanks god! As predicted by the weather forecast, it was a
sunny day!
We passed by one coffee shop “Il Pirata
Cinque Terre” and tried the pastries.
The owner was so funny and friendly, and the pastries were just perfect.
The yummy apricot pastry filled my happy
tummy, also keep the pocket friendly. The pastry cost around EUR 2.5 and drink
EUR 2.5, which gave a total of EUR 5 per person. It is the cheapest food I ever
had in Europe.
After filled my happy tummy, I’ve gained
back my mood and we continue to hunt for some photo spot locations. ^^
You need to hike for few minutes to arrive
this stunning place.
Then heading down to the ocean.
Manarola
Manarola is my favourite among the five lands in Cinque Terre. In
Manarola, definitely you must visit Nessun Dorma restaurant. It offers the best
lunch view in Cinque Terre. Imagine to be seated there, enjoy a glass of wine,
taste the local cuisine, listen to the local music, see the beautiful stunning
view, and feel the ambiance... Great isn’t it?
We spent about 2 hours in Nessun Dorma and
heading down to buy this fried squid. Looks cute but taste ordinary.
Riomaggiore
Overall, Cinque Terre was a great
experience. I enjoy most of my time in Manarola, especially in Nessun Dorma. Of course,
Cinque Terre wouldn’t be so fun without my travel mate, Alda. Travelling is not just
about where you go, but who you travel with play an important part to increase
the happiness in travel.
I did not mentioned any sunset in this trip
due to time constraint that unable us to see the sunset in this beautiful town.
But, if you have chance to visit Cinque Terre, do make time to see the
beautiful sunset here.
Thank you for reading ^^
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