Cinque Terre

In our planning of the Europe trip, we decided to spend a little more time in one place at the halfway mark to make sure we could finish strong.  We figured everyone would need a little breather before the final push of the trip and it just so happened that we would be arriving at a beautiful place to take a bit of a respite--Cinque Terre (pronounced "Chin quay Terr-ah).  It literally means "Five Cities" in Italian, named for the five cities in a national park that are built right on the coastline of the Ligurian Sea. 

A few years ago, someone bought us a refrigerator calendar that had some pictures of various spots in Italy on it.  My favorite pic was of a city in this region with the multi-colored pastel houses and the clear blue water dotted with little boats.  It just seemed magical.  So I was pleased that this place fell right at the half-way mark in our journey. 

It's crazy expensive to stay in the state park, so we scoped out a city just south of there to book a stay--a town called Portovenere. Even though it was not one of the five cities, you'd never have known it because it was just as scenic and we were blessed to have picked a house that had a view of the beach.  We were also within walking distance of the little town which was important because we had to walk everywhere we went.

Portovenere was exactly what we were hoping to find in Italy.  It was beautiful, peaceful, authentic, and it was right on the water's edge--following the theme of our sabbatical.  We really enjoyed it because it was small enough that we could turn the kids loose without worrying that they would get lost or abducted or get into trouble.  Stacy and I could also have some time alone as well taking in the city. 

One of the things I LOVE about being on the water is the boats.  There were so many beautiful yachts that ported in Portovenere.  Some of them were ridiculous!  I checked on one that was anchored in front of where we were staying and it came with a crew of 12 and cost 550,000 Euros a WEEK, about $608,000!  Can you imagine?!  That was another thing that we opted not to do on this trip.  Nevertheless, it was fun to see them arrive in port. 

We enjoyed going to the beach here and not having such an aggressive sight-seeing schedule. One side of the beach was like a typical beach, except instead of sand, they had gravel.  That wasn't too appealing.  The other side had massive boulders that were used for laying out or swimming.  It was beautiful!  We all welcomed the opportunity to lay around and soak in the sun for a bit.

We did feel like we owed it to ourselves to see the five cities and made a trek over there for one day.  There is a hiking trail that goes right along the side of the mountain from city to city. We found that most of it had been closed because of mudslides, so we were only able to walk one part of it.  This was the hardest hike I've ever done in my life!  It was an interminable hike straight up and down a mountain.  We were soaked with sweat by the time we arrived at the next city.  The reward was an impeccable view of this city that we'd seen on the calendar.  So beautiful! 

The rest of the cities we decided to visit by train.  You would not believe how crowded these were.  We were literally packed into the trains like sardines.  You could barely breathe!  We were packed in, standing room only, all the way out to the train doors.  I was so grateful that we opted not to try to stay in these cities because they were so tourist infested and busy, but I was glad that we trekked out to them because they really were the inspiration for the whole trip.