THE AFFAIR WITH FIVE LANDS
Full Disclosure: I'm having an affair with Cinque Terre. Maybe don't tell Venice. Or Jason. It started in 2006 when I visited with my mom. Our conversation went something like this:
Me: How can we stay here? Mom: Well, there's the issue of your father... I know you think I'm crazy, but trust me, you will be overcome with the desire to send for your things and put your house up for sale. And after the hustling and bustling of city travel, the Ligurian Sea's five little coastal villages is a welcome reprieve, begging you to slooooow down and spend a little bit of time doing a whole lot of nothing. If you would like to do more than nothing, you can hike, train or boat between the villages of Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore (it's a National Park, eh?). You won't be encountering much traffic in the villages. They are not made for vehicles and in fact we left our bus in the nearby town of Levanto and took a short, local train ride into the Cinque Terre to Monterosso. Aimless wandering is encouraged, and we found ourselves doing just that in between houses, churches, and mom-and-pop restaurants. We may have even accidentally ended up in someone's backyard, resulting in the words "A LA MADONNA!" being shouted at us, followed by some laughter from both parties. During our two-night visit, the trail between the villages was closed due to landslides and the sea too rough to take the boat. We felt this was nature's way of giving us permission to cool it for a while. We enjoyed the sandy beach at Monterosso and stuffed ourselves with local specialties, including seafood and pesto. We did take a quick train trip to Vernazza, which was a non-negotiable for me. I stayed there with my mom in 2006 and it was love at first anchovy. When I heard of the flooding that happened there and in Monterosso in October 2011, I was devastated. While some small businesses (and they are all small businesses) did not recover, the Italian government and local residents came together to help these two beauties to get back on their feet.
Tourism is such an essential part of the local economy and I knew I would have to return someday. There was not a lot of physical evidence left of the floods when I returned, other than some buildings being bordered up. We wandered the waterfront and had the best pizza of our lives while overlooking the sea. Siiiiigh... |