Cinque Terre: Manarola and Riomaggiori

You may have noticed the titles for our day in Cinque Terre only mention four towns, not five as implied by the name. Realizing we would not have time for all five and still make our connections, we skipped Corniglia (the middle town) because it involved a 100 meter climb to the city center.

Manarola

Manarola has perhaps the most stunning views of the five towns. Don and Ashley hiked down to a boat launch, spending far more time down there than I would have guessed (or else I would have joined them). When running I have a theory: everything that goes down, must come up. I wasn't in the mood to climb back up from the boat launch.

Instead I took the higher road, the Via Bambino, and saw a different part of town. Yes, I see the irony of not wanting to hike up the boat launch road but gleefully climbed up a road I didn't have to climb. 

At the top of the small hill was a playground and local life.

It was lovely being on my own for a bit. The gelato places in Manarola did not look inspiring. At this point I was really wishing I bought a second gelato in Vernazza.

We are not the only ones with this idea!

Yes, a bit crowded

Locks of Love

It is nice to be in paradise

Ahh...the views!

Trying to capture the sunset

Hey -- a rare picture of me when I'm not looking

Time to head to the next and last town: Riomaggiori 

Riomaggiori

Riomaggiori is considered the most romantic of the five towns. It also boasts the nicest sunset. A perfect way to end our trip to the Italian Riviera.

We had to climb up another mountain to find the perfect spot to watch the sunset. Unfortunately even thirty minutes away from sunset I realized Mother Nature wasn't going to give us a stunning sunset. I also realized, if we left before sunset we could catch the second to last train back to Florence. If something went wrong with the last train that night, we would be sleeping in a train station until the 4 AM train. The second to last train meant we had a shot at finding dinner in Florence. Those observations turned out to be psychic!

Nature is amazing

Stunning views at all turns

I could tell the sunset was not to be spectacular
that night, but had the potential of being amazing

Pretty

Walking back to the train station

We grabbed a pizza for the road and amazingly the train to La Spezia arrived within moments. It was meant to be!

Sadly no bikes, but room for us.

Ashley found a friend

An old time train schedule (yes, for that day).
How did we survive without cell phones and
electronic schedules at our fingertips?

Unlike the train we took that morning, this train required a change in Pisa (as did the next train). There were a bunch of us making the same trip. When the train to Pisa was late, we were all stressing about making our connection. At the rate we were going, we would arrive in Pisa about two minutes AFTER our train left. Fortunately because we skipped sunset there was another train that night, but no one wanted to wait an extra hour.

A college student used her phone to determine which track the train would be on. We designated Don and a track star from the group of college students to run ahead and keep the doors open for us. Once we got to Pisa I encouraged those not racing to catch the train to Florence to GET OUT OF OUR WAY! At least one man didn't get the message and was nearly trampled by the rest of us.

We made it! The train waited for us on Track 8. Even those in other cars who did not know which track to race to made the transfer.  We annoyed a mom with a sleeping baby when we all let out a cheer as we entered the train car! WE DID IT! I did feel bad for the mom. I think she changed cars.

We were finally on a train that was not overflowingly full. We all took turns snoozing.

It was a tiring day. If I were to do it again, I'd let Don and Ashley hike to their hearts' content and meet them in each of the different towns.

Ashley did do it again the following weekend with friends. They stayed overnight (which the tour books highly recommend) and hiked all of the trails. She agreed the trail we did would have been better in the other direction. She did say after the day trippers go home, the towns are very quiet and there are very few dining options -- only the cheapest and most expensive places.

At no point did anyone check our day passes, except at the trailhead. 

Back in Florence Ashley went to her home and we foraged for dinner. The first place said they were closed for the night. The second place said they were closed. When the third place said we could do take away, we took them up on it! In Italy, land of pasta and pizza, we had Chinese food.

I had beef curry. Don was not sure what he got. We took it to our apartment. It was okay, but not as good as Tiger Noodle in Princeton.