Living with the French - on exchange in Nice by Timo Virtanen

Cinque Terre

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011 at 23:00 | categories: Travel

During the time my parents were in Antibes most people I got to know returned to their homes, and the following weekend pretty much every one else did the same. However, the American dude is still here for a month and so we felt we needed to come up with things to do. He had heard good things about a place called Cinque Terre and without thinking about it too much we decided to go.

The following morning we hopped on a train in Juan-les-Pins and 6 hours later got into Riomaggiore, one of the Cinque Terre’s towns. We had to change the train in Ventimiglia and Genova.

Map

While every single person you see on the streets seems to be an American tourist in the area, the scenery really makes the place worth a visit. As the name implies, Cinque Terre consists of five little towns built close to each other. Tourists travel between the towns either by train, boat or by hiking pathways that have in my estimation about a gazillion stairs. As one hiker we bumped into put it, it’s ridonculous.

Since we didn’t really plan the trip at all, finding accommodation proved to be challenging at first since all the hostels and hotels were fully booked way in advance. We were already planning on sleeping under the stars when we realized there were lots of rooms for rent in all towns. We slept the first night in Manarola and the second in Corniglia.

The experience would’ve probably been better off-season, but even with all the tourists Cinque Terre was definitely worth the visit.

Riomaggiore

They tried and they failed

Manarola

Yes mother, I was athletic

Eddy was trying to keep up with my pace. Turns out he could. Easily.

Vernazza

A philosophic moment