hola, isabel

Remember how we spent a month in Europe with the kids last August?  And remember how I told you all about our time in Germany but then forgot to tell you about the other three countries we visited?  Well, it may have been six months ago, but I know you want to hear all about Italy.  Right?

RIGHT?

Good.

We left Berlin and flew to Pisa, Italy.  Our plan was to stay in Pisa one night, just long enough to see the Leaning Tower and take a train in the morning to our next stop, the Cinque Terre.  We got to our hotel, threw our bags down, got a map from the front desk and walked to the tower.

The King really liked it, but I have to admit it just wasn’t that exciting to me.  There we SO MANY PEOPLE there that it took away from so much of the magic of being there.

(We’ve typically traveled to Europe in the winter.  Best thing about traveling to Europe in the winter is NO CROWDS!)

We hung out for a bit before heading back to our hotel.  We knew we’d be coming back through Pisa on our way to Spain, so we figured we’d climb the tower then.

We arrived, by train, in Vernazza.  I had found us a room to rent online and our first order of business was to figure out where exactly we were staying.  My instructions were to exit the train station, find a shop with a sign that says “enoteca” and ask for Paola to call Anna, who would then come and get us to take us to our room.

Yeah, that took longer then it should.  Anna was too busy to come and get us, so we were given directions and told to walk to our room.  On our way up the street (the only street in town) we passed a little park.  That made Babboo pretty excited.

We found our room (that’s our room on the main floor) and were happy with it.  Our bathroom was down the hall, but we didn’t have to share it, so that was great.

The King and I later admitted to each other that when we first arrived in Vernazza we thought, “what in the heck are we going to do here for FIVE DAYS?!”  The town is super duper tiny.  It has about 600 residents and only the one road (where cars are only allowed to drive on EARLY in the morning.  There are two little grocers, but again, they are only open in the morning for a few hours.  There are a ton of bakeries and little places selling pizza and seafood and a few sit down restaurants.

The main reason people do to the Cinque Terra is to hike through the five towns; Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore.

Wikipedia says:

A walking trail, known as Sentiero Azzurro (”Light Blue Trail”), connects the five villages. The trail from Riomaggiore to Manarola is called the Via Dell’Amore (”Love Walk”) and is wheelchair-friendly. The stretch from Manarola to Corniglia is the easiest to hike, although the main trail into Corniglia finishes with a climb of 368 stairs.  The trail from Corniglia to Vernazza is steep at certain places. The trail from Vernazza to Monterosso is by far the steepest. It winds through olive orchards and vineyards and is rough in places, but offers the best view of the bay and the spectacular approaches to both Monterosso and Vernazza. It takes approximately 5 hours to walk it. There are fees to use the more popular walking trails

We had to take into account that we had both kids with us and that I’d be carrying Rerun.  We got up one morning and did the trail from Vernazza to Monterossa, which you just read was the steepest.  It is also the one with the most breathtaking views!

You can see Monterossa  behind The King and Babboo in this next picture.  This was about the half way mark.

Once we got to Monterossa there really wasn’t anything to do so we caught the ferry back to Vernazza.  Babboo was pretty excited about taking the ferry and told us he’d never rode on a boat before.  (I can neither confirm or deny that claim.)

The rest of our time in Vernazza was spent at the beach.  Babboo couldn’t get enough of the sand and the water.

And Rerun loved just sitting on the blanket with me, in the shade of the umbrella Anna let us borrow.

With pauses for occasional dips in the water.

Since Babboo liked riding in the ferry so much The King decided to rent a kayak and take Babboo out in it.  Rerun and I waiting on the beach and I tried zoom way in to get some pictures of them.

Another thing that The King and Babboo did together was hike up to the top of the watch tower at the Doria Castle.  Apparently it was used a gazillion years ago to protect them from pirates.  ARG!

They were able to get some nice views of the town from up there.

The King and I celebrated our 11th anniversary while in Vernazza.  We got some bread, cheese and meat and celebrated with a little picnic near the tree outside our place.

The King was cutting the cheese (tee-hee) and sliced up his thumb.  I tried to talk to him into becoming Blood Brothers with me, but he wouldn’t go for it.  (He spent the rest of the trip with a pretty huge gash and in a lot of pain.  Poor guy.)

Towards the end of our stay we decided to do one more of the tails. We chose the Via Dell’Amore trail since it’s the “Walk of Love” and it was our anniversary

The King and Babboo really liked this trail.  I admit there were some beautiful views.  But the walk was SCARY.  Check it out.

Can you see that the walk is hooked on to the side of the sheer cliff?!  CAN YOU SEE THAT?

Long time readers will know of my disdain of sheer cliffs.  Yeah, I don’t like them at all.  At all.  Not even a little bit.  (When we were about to the end a car started to come up the walk.  A CAR.  I was pretty sure the walk couldn’t hold the weight and that we were all going to fall to our death.  Alas, we didn’t.  Although I did almost have a heart attack.)

In the end The King and I both agreed that we could have stayed five more days.  Vernazza was amazing.  Seriously one of the most amazing places we’re ever been.  We were sad to leave.  But we had a train to Pisa to catch and then a plane to Barcelona the next day.

What makes our time in Vernazza so bitter sweet is that shortly after our trip it was almost completely ruined by flash floods filling the streets with rocks, mud and debris up to 12 feet deep.

I can’t look at these pictures without crying.

Ciao, Vernazza. We hope we can visit you again.

We spent one more night in Pisa. Our plan was for The King and Babboo to buy tickets and climb to the top of the Leaning Tower.  (I had no interest.)  We walked over to the tower and The King went to buy the tickets.  Sadly, you have to be eight to climb to the top.

(One more reason why “it’s great to be eight!”)

Babboo was quite bummed about the whole thing and to this day will tell anyone who asks that he does not like Pisa.  But we made it up to him by buying him dinner at McDonalds.

Next stop, Barcelona, Spain.