Cinque Terre is heaven on earth

WOW. Anyone reading this needs to stop and buy a plane ticket to Cinque Terre and see it for yourself. The pictures don't even begin to do it justice. I have seen beautiful water in Greece and Belize before, but this is entirely different and I think might be my favorite place I've ever been to.

The Cinque Terre are 5 small towns perched on the edge of the cliffs of northern Italy. The people are amazingly friendly, and all the locals from the towns know each and every resident. We could tell this by the way they greeted each other on the trains running to and from each town. The 5 towns are connected by rail, road, and trail. We hiked the coastal trail that runs from the first town, Riomaggiore, to the last one, Monterosso. My favorite town of the 5 was the 4th one, Vernazza. To me, it was the quaintest of the towns and the one that best fit my idealized Italy. After 4 months of experiencing a very nice Italy, but one that did NOT meet my initial expectations, it was nice to know that there really were places like the ones in my mind here as well.

This is what we saw when we first stepped off the train. It was good to be back in Italy :)!!!!





.loving life.


View from the trail as we hiked.


Happy in the Cinque Terre



Vernazza. This one was my favorite town! I thought it was the cutest. Great amazing wonderful splendid views. To the right: a mountain of grape vines and stunning cliffs. To the left: endless Mediterranean. I kind of wanted to stay forever.


Close up of the rocks on the beach. They reminded me of Lake McDonald rocks, mom! I thought of you :)

Beautiful flowers along the trail

We followed the signs...

and they led to this! Amazing, calm cove. SO much fun to swim in. The water was so clear we could see the schools of fish swimming near us. And this water was SALTY. I accidentally went in with my watch on and was picking salt off for hours. But, because it was so salty, I felt really light in the water and wasn't afraid to swim out farther. This was definitely worth it- because it was so so so clear for a really long way out into the sea!



Vernazza.

A pirate cove!






I'm not sure which town this is.


Jackie enjoying some fresh fruit on the trail.


Getting ready to basically repell to the free beach. It was so steep we really had to use the rope or else we would have fallen!


Ahhhhh mazing



Wobbly bridge on the hike. Chaz, I had nobby knees! Jackie and I had a re-enactment for you :)


It looked so good I wanted to drink it.


Thats all for this one.... see you all in 5/6 days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!