Day 19 - July 2 - Real Hiking

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We lingered on the balcony again, knowing it was really our last morning to do so. The hiking trail between Corniglia and Vernazza was supposed to be the most challenging, though the Vernazza to Monterosso one is the longest, so we had consulted many guide books and recommendations on which direction to do the trail. Rick Steeves said to start in Vernazza, and get the most “technically challenging” - and the steepest - part over with first. Others suggested that the climb up from Corniglia was more gradual. We figured since we were already here, we’d might as well start in Corniglia.

I won’t sugar coat it - the climb up was hard. It took about an hour to get all the way up. There were a million stairs and a million more “natural” stair cases or hills. Some parts were awfully narrow too, near the cliff, so you did have to be careful where you stepped. Even the climb was beautiful though- we passed olive trees and lemons the size of my fist. We saw flowers, and gorgeous views of Corniglia and of the ocean, and all sorts of birds, butterflies in every colour.. We had to stop a lot (well, I had to stop a lot; Sam had to backtrack twenty steps a lot and wait for me). But it was exhilarating.

And once we hit the top, it was magnificent. It felt like you could see the whole world from up there, could touch the sky. The most spectacular views were back towards Corniglia and Manarola…. Until Vernazza came into view. Vernazza looks like it is built on the cliffside, like it could fall in any second, its famous tower on the tip, leading the way. It emerges out of nowhere on the trail, clinging to the rocks, with beautiful waves crashing underneath it. We had a very pleasant forty minute hike across the dirt paths at the top, enjoying the new spectacular views with each step.

We reached the stairs down to Vernazza, and about a third of the way down, came across a mom negotiating with her teenaged daughter, who had basically sat down and refused to go any farther. They had come all the way from Moterosso - so would have been hiking over 3 hours already - and having just climbed up (most of the way) from Vernazza, the kid was fed up. The mom was trying to patiently explain the plan to do the whole costal trail in a day, and the kid kept asking “why?”. The mom was also exasperated saying things like “I’m thirty years older than you and I can do it!” (To be fair to the kid, mom was in peak physical condition and while the kid was thin and gorgeous, she seemed more of the spa-and-beach type than the sporty type). We lied and told her she was nearly at the top, but told the truth when we said the views were worth it. With a typical teenage grunt, that got her going, and the mom flashed us a grateful smile. To this day, I wonder if they made it all the way to Riomaggiore.

I am convinced we picked the right direction to walk. The stairs down to Vernazza were steep and unending, and more than once on the way down those on the way up asked us, “how much farther?”. The difference is this: starting in Vernazza means starting the climb with a 35-minute climb straight up seemingly undending stairs, but the rest of the hike is fairly simple, as the walk down to Corniglia is more gradual. Starting in Corniglia means a one-hour, gradual, very tough incline, and then you finish the walk with the horribly boring stairs down to Vernazza. Rick Steeves is right in that if you want to get the borning and hard part out of the way first, start in Vernazza. But those stairs up would have done me in and I would not have enjoyed the rest of the walk. The more gradual climb up from Conriglia was the right choice for us.

In Vernazza we found some delicious paninis at Il Forno - paninis we would eat for the next three days - ate some very interesting “chilli chocolate” gelato which was quite good, toured the main streets, and went for a swim in the harbour. We followed schools of fish around, swam in and out of the nearby rock “cave”, and had a very serious discussion in the middle of the harbour about how many times we would be able to afford to come back here.

Vernazza is the place to come if you have young kids. Its small beach is perfect, and its street is interesting enough without being as crowded as Riomaggiore or Monterosso. We were relocating to Vernazza the next day so we didn’t spend too much time there. Instead, we headed back to Corniglia, sat on our balcony for a bit, then went for an early evening swim. The sun was dancing on the water in Corniglia’s cove, literally making the water sparkle.

We went back to the restaurant of the nice man who helped us, and had fresh fish from the harbour and pesto pasta, and desert of gelato and tiramusu. It was delicious, as we expected and - because we were return visitors - the owner himself came out to say hi. The evening finished with a final “buon serra” to our elderly neighbours, and a few shots of limoncello on the balcony.

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