Cinque Terre is not one place, but rather it is 5 cities connected with a regional train system. Each city has its own vibe, although they have a very similar look. Rick Steves gives good descriptions of them and I highly recommend his Hulu video on his visit there. I also used this site for recommendations. Check out the map of the cities:
We arrived in Monterosso (the northernmost town) and had to take the regional train to Corniglia (the middle town) where we were staying. The regional train requires validated train passes, but rarely do they get checked. These trains come once an hour so you very much have to plan your day around them and they get really, really crowded! En route to Corniglia, we overheard someone saying "I skipped seeing Corniglia, I didn't want to climb those stairs." Uh oh, how many stairs?! Turned out to be around 400 or so to get to the top!
4:45pm Gelato and Hiking
We hiked those stairs which were brutal and obviously had to treat ourselves to gelato. Luckily we had a few places to choose from.We explored Corniglia a bit--lots of cute restaurants and shops. We knew we were there to hike, so we chose to hike one town north to Vernazza. The coastal paths were mostly closed due to rain damage (I think), so this trail wasn't completely along the water, but there were some INCREDIBLE views along the way. It took about 45 minutes or so, and the descent into Vernazza was stunning.
6:15 Dinner down by the water, and wine in Corniglia
We walked through Vernazza, soaking it all in. We were hungry by this point so we settled on a restaurant down by the water. The waves crashed against the rocks nearby and it was fun to watch. We enjoyed a local special--trofie with pesto. It is a local kind of handmade pasta, and Cinque Terre is the birthplace of pesto. Needless to say, best pasta I've ever had. We were pretty tired at this point, so we took the regional train back to Corniglia, hiked the stairs again, and found a restaurant to overlook the water and enjoy sangria. This was a great intro to CT, and we were very excited for a full day of hiking and food tomorrow.
Helpful Tip: The Cinque Terre Card bundles the price of the trains between the villages (but not ferries) and a hiking day-pass. We bought the card for the day so we could do our hiking and take the train as often as we wanted, (a single trip is about 2 euros I believe).
8:00am Up early for breakfast, Riomaggiore
We stopped in a cafe in Corniglia for coffee and a pastry. Mere wasn't a huge fan of the pastries--she said they all had a hint of orange flavoring that she didn't like. I had no problem eating the rest of her croissant. We took the train to the southernmost town to start our day. It was a gorgeous city, check the picture below. There were floating boats and you would walk down to the water and dip your toes in. Not great swimming, but people were already laying out by 9am to sun tan. We would be back later for lunch--trofie with pesto--from a place that made it on the spot and put it in to go containers.
10am Hike to Manarola and Lunch
Oh boy, this was a hike!!! With the coastal paths closed, the inland paths were a little more strenuous. We gained and lost elevation like crazy, and every climb involved hundreds of stairs. I was impressed with some of the people making the climb. Every climb was totally worth the view at the top, though. This hike was pretty long, at least an hour, and it was tough. We finally arrived in Manarola, the 4th town, and we walked around a little. We treated ourselves to a local specialty--focaccia. For lunch, as I mentioned, we took the regional train back to Riomaggiore to grab lunch quickly and then took another train to Corniglia. The hope was to get swimsuits for later but our hostel was closed. Oh, well.
12:00pm Hike to Vernazza, enjoy gelato
It was a gorgeous day out so we decided to hike the trail from Corniglia to Vernazza again. This was the 45 minute, pretty easy trail. The views were splendid, again. In Vernazza, we got gelato down by the water. For our last hike of the day, we hiked from Vernazza to Monterosso al Mare. The picture below is a picture looking down into Vernazza. The yellow and blue umbrellas are where we had dinner the night before and where we enjoyed our gelato. Pretty amazing.
2:00pm Hike to Monterosso and go swimming!
The hike to Monterosso al Mare was the only coastal trail open so we used our Cinque Terre pass. Along the way, the water was just SOOO blue and we knew we wanted to go for a swim. This hike wasn't too hard, but it was pretty long. As we approached the final city, the temptation was so great to go swimming so we found a shop to buy shorts and went for a dip. 100% worth the purchase. If we had more time, I would totally spend a half day or so laying on the beach here, this is the town with the best swimming and has more of the resort type places.
5:00pm Back to Manarola for dinner outside and orange drinks
We were hungry from so much hiking, so we took the train back to Corniglia to dry off and get changed and then took another train to Manarola to go back to the pasta place from lunch. We took our dinner down to the rocks by the water to enjoy the sunset. We had seen orange drinks EVERYWHERE in Italy so far, and we had to try them. It was an aperol spritz--we were not huge fans of the drink, but glad we tried them. We sat for a while, enjoying our drinks and talking to a honeymooning couple.
I had wanted to see the city light up at night, so we took the train all the way north to Monerosso and walked around. It was a little eerie at night, but it was good to enjoy the night air. I'd recommend timing a hike to see Manarola or Vernazza at sunset to see the lights light up the town. We didn't quite get the timing right.
Overall, this was maybe one of my favorite parts of the 2 week trip to Italy. I could have easily spent another day or 2 here, relaxing, hiking, and eating. Easily the most gorgeous place I'd ever seen.
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