And anchovies.
The train ride from Siena to Manarola went much more smoothly than we would ever have hoped. Except for the additional 10 Kilos of cheese and salted meat we were now toting. We made new friends, Leslie and Jeff from Walnut Creek California while we were waiting on the train from Empoli. We were in awe of how light they were traveling. One very small carry on bag and two medium sized backpacks, that’s it. They had just retired from their jobs, were selling their house and on the road together. Staying at Air BNB stops that they booked at the last minute. And we thought we were cutting edge?
Arriving at the stop for Manarola we hauled the luggage off the train, down steps, up steps and through a 300 meter tunnel in solid rock and popped out to find the golf cart and porter from our hotel waiting for us. Just like St. John, minus the rum punch. Really don’t know how that cart made it up the hill to the hotel, even without passengers or luggage it seemed impossible for such a small vehicle to conquer such a steep and winding “street”. At the hotel we greeted with the local substitute for rum punch, Prosecco, as the Manager copied our passports and the porter hauled the bags up to our room we got to sit, enjoy the view with a chilled glass of bubbly. A guy could get used to this!
But there was payback, up the stairs to our room to unpack and get ready to start exploring. Our first steps of Manarola, and Cinque Terre were in some ways typical of the region and some ways atypical. Typical in that they had no fixed or standard height, ranging from eight inch (sorry for slipping out of metric) to sixteen inch rises so short legged people were at a distinct disadvantage and the width of each step was just too narrow for a modern foot to fit, on the way down you had to turn sideways to land your whole foot on the step. Atypical in that these were new and a non-slippery smooth material, so good on them for that. They also had handholding spots, hate to use the term railing, that was functional and necessary.
We broke out the cameras and started, carefully exploring Manarola. Going down to the port was a constant brake test, skateboarders would go wild here.
The housing, the terraced gardens overflowing with artichokes, lemons & fig trees, grapevines were amazing. The level of work to establish and maintain these in this environment was hard to really fathom. But people were out working their garden terrace, putting up new stone walls and carrying all kinds of equipment up places that I was reluctant to try just carrying a camera. Tough, stout folks made up these villages. And the photo ops were everywhere you looked. We found a place for a bite to eat, surprise, and started with two spritzers, one lemon one Aperol and salted anchovies on bread. Anchovies, like cilantro can be quite a litmus test, you are either a fan or not, no in between. We happen to be big fans! Salted, marinated in lemon and oil, deep fried, we are in!
The local fishermen haul in new batches daily and sell them first to the restaurants then to the general public. The bar was on a point just above the port and just below the cemetery, the little piece of land was called Ponta Bonfiglio, so you knew the food and drink would be good.
Another tourist, with her dog. No word on whether the dog had sunscreen applied
After spending a few hours exploring we headed back up the hill to rest before dinner at what everyone said was one of the best spots in Cinque Terre, Trattoria Dal Billy. Billy must have been a reference to goats, the path…”road”… was up above our hotel, around and around because nothing is straight here, and then down old concrete steps to a table with a gorgeous view overlooking the town of Manarola and the Mediterranean.
More seafood and pasta and wine (rinse and repeat I know). This region, Liguria, is famous for it’s pesto. So one pasta was pesto, one was a very spicy tomato sauce. Both preceded by anchovies, followed by a grilled fish filet…see grilled means healthy right?
So ended our first night, oh except there was this one thing we noticed about our room, which was about the size of a regular cruise ship cabin, there were no curtains. We were working out alternative measures to block the light, when our handy porter saved the day and showed us how to close the outside shutters. Stupid Americans, who needs curtains when you have shutters.
Day two started bright and early, but not as early as the guys across the way working on the wall,
with breakfast with huge cups of cappuccino and interesting discussion with another guest at our hotel, turns out he was a dentist about our age, from Orange County California.
He was traveling with both his wife and his female office manager. Write your own reality TV show, Bonnie has a version that would make the Housewives of Orange County blush. But the interesting story that morning was about how this guy, got these two women (all about our age) to hike the trail between Manarola and the next town over, Riomaggiore, very close by, but straight up and straight down. 2,000 Cinque Terre steps, meaning old, crumbling, uneven, high, steep steps with no railing or rotting wood railings. These guys talked about getting on their hands and knees, pulling themselves up, but they wouldn’t turn back. The dentist cult was sore as hell and provided enough of a cautionary tale that we decided we would stick to the “baby trails”
We had a guided tour of the region planned that day with Loradona.
Loradona met us right outside the hotel and showed us a “secret” passage down into the town, guess what it was more stairs. Same type but between the buildings and more direct than the street. We hopped the train to Loradona’s home town of Sestri Levantre. A small city that grew from a medieval city centered on fishing. People here were known for their boat building and sailing acumen.
Next on the agenda was a visit to Santa Margarita Ligure, the city that spawned Christopher Columbus, honored with a statue by the port.
They also had just been entered into the Guinness book of World Records for having the longest red carpet in the world. A marketing gimmick by the tourism board that for two weeks laid a carpet on a walkway along the ocean all the way to Portofino. Funny, but no one asked who we were wearing when we walked the red carpet! This is also where we had lunch at a very very local place, where the menus were printed in the local dialect of Italian and the food was some of the best flavors we had in this part of the trip. Simple food, but huge in flavor, not real photogenic but robust. Loradona had to translate the menu for us.
After lunch we boarded a ferry from Santa Margarita to Portofino. A small fishing village of 500 residents that include villas for Dolce & Gabbana, Armani, Rod Stewart and is a stopping off point for many of the superyachts of the Mediterranean. Too early in the season for the villas or celebrities, much to Bonnie’s chagrin. No snooping or stalking. But the views were fabulous, we heard the story of how a German expatriate woman married to an Italian living in Portofino saved the city from being destroyed by the Germans as they were pulling out as the Allied advanced their invasion of Italy in WWII. Pleading with the local commander to save the city, she is remembered as a heroine, the captain who listened to her and spared the city was greeted back after the war as a hero. In the recent past they also found a cave, connected to the woman’s home, that they think was a base for German submarines, no wonder they listened. But now famous for the rich and famous it is a beautiful place.
The ferry back to Santa Margarita, train back to Manarola and that was our day. We were too tired to make our dinner reservation to the next town over so we stayed at the hotel, sipping wine and writing up some story for the blog. And listening to the Orange County dentist flap his gums with a couple from Australia. Like Canadians, we have always found Aussie’s to be friendly, engaging and likable, these two proved the exception to the rule. A physician and his wife, total Aussie asshats, they seemed to get on well with the dentist though. But we retired for the evening and started as early as the rock wall workers the next day.
We were on our own, but working from a suggestion by Loradona, we headed by ferry up to Porto Venere from Manarola. But before we went nautical, we took our one and only hike in Cinque Terre. We called it the Baby trail that started right outside our hotel and went to the port area of Manarola, by way of the cemetery and Ponta Bonfiglio. I started up the steps of the trail to Corniglia for photo purposes only. The Bambino Trail was enough, thanking Bonnie’s knee surgeon and our physical therapist for being able to tackle this one. We’ll leave the more verticals challenges to Orange County residents.
Boarding the ferry was like walking the plank in reverse. They extended a ramp from the bow of the boat, it had wheels on the bottom, the captain kept the engines firing to keep the boat close to the rock used as the “dock” and we climbed about 30 degrees up ramp, then landed on the deck of the boat, which was bouncing a bit on the swell caused by the engines. You needed instant sea legs to keep from landing in someone’s lap or on your head. Welcome aboard, matey.
Grey skies and a little cool, but what views as we headed south to Porto Venere, where they had a proper dock to exit the boat. Off we went to explore the small medieval city with a beautiful chapel on the hill overlooking the entry to the bay. An excellent light lunch, really, and then back to explore some more of the Cinque Terre.
By boat back north to Riomaggiore, not quite as picturesque as Manarola, but right over the hill.
By train ten minutes to Vernazza, the best port in Cinque Terre. Great photos and dinner at Gianni Franzi’s, a well known tourist spot and recommended by Loradona. We were too early for the recommended deep fried anchovies, but had some great food with fabulous people watching and we got our first taste of the local dessert wine, Sciacchetrà, good luck with that pronunciation, my only hint is that the ci is pronounced as ch, after that you are on your own. But the stuff was fantastic. Barbara would love this more than Ice Wine and Manischewitz!
Train back to Manarola, up the hill and steps to the hotel room.
The next morning we left early, so early that the hotel staff hat not arrived so we hauled our luggage down the uneven steps, and rolled them downhill to the train station. That was a hell of trip with no caffeine! Train from Manarola to La Spezia, 10 minutes, high speed train from La Spezia to Rome, nearly three hours, Rome to Naples via another high speed train that hit 300 kph 45 minutes. Then car from Naples to Amalfi 1 hour. Stories about this travel day on the next post.