Italy's Salvation :)

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July 19th 2012

Published: July 19th 2012

Alarm goes off 5:45, we grab showers, but still groggy, needing coffee, and stiff from a restless night, we trudge to the meeting point for our tour (with time to grab a very strong, but very tiny cup of espresso). I'm really second guessing myself at this piont, thinking I should have allowed more time in the U.K. and maybe skipped Italy all together, atleast until our Rome trip. But I also really wanted to see Venice, so I just waited to see what the day held in store for us.

We had a full tour bus, with our guide Eddy who did speak English but very heavily accented, and there was one other American couple on the tour with more Australians than any other country. So we head into the Italian countryside, passing through several villages, but nothing really as striking as photos you see depicting Italy. The style of structures was often very similar to other European designs, basic structures, nothing particularly unique or different, though you did see old bell towers and cathedrals in the center of town and some old farm houses in the country. The older sections of town seemed more true to our perceived Italian villages, but often right up against the newer, more standard looking apartments and community buildings. And still the graffiti. I have to say that it was one of the most unexpcted and disappointing things I saw in Italy and it was everywhere. I don't know if it has just become accepted or too difficult to prevent, but I found it to be a major detraction from both the historical and cultural beauty of Italy.

I'm not able to take many pictures on our bus ride as most of the pretty shots were on the opposite side of the bus, but I do have some other shots from our trip when we're driving through the Italian Alps so you'll see those later on. Our first stop is in a small village where we stop for about a half hour, long enough for everyone to file off, grab a bathroom break and a cup of coffee and pile back on. Then we continue on to La Spezia (sounds pretty much like it's spelled) where we get on a train to go to Cinque Terra (pronounced chinka (soft a) teara with a hard rolling r and hard ending a....tear as in tearing a piece of paper). We were supposed to take a ferry ride across the Mediterranean and by Portofino (the MOST picturesque town), but there was a weather front causing winds and high waves that closed the ferrys for a while, so we missed out on that. 😞 I was really looking forward to Portofino, and again, wondering if this stop had been a mistake.

In La Spezia, we switch from bus to train and head out to Cinque Terra. Cinque Terra is 5 villages built on the side of mountains along part of the Italian coast of the Mediterranean. It's called the Italian Riviera and is just about 180 miles down the coast from the French Riviera. Only walking trails, boats and trains can reach the villages. There are no roads suitable for driving to any of the villages. In October of 2011, torrential rains caused mudslides and caused a lot of damage in the Cinque Terra although most of it has been cleaned up and damage isn't obviously visible. Looking at pictures prior to the mudslide, it does seem to be minus some buildlings in some areas though they aren't obvious unless you see them side by side. Our guide, Eddy, has a favorite place to eat and had previously taken a group to eat there last year. He left behind his umbrella, which they had saved for him and gave to him on our trip. They had attached a humorous note to it for him about it having survived the floods and mudslides and it though still working, it was definitely a bit dirty.

What to say about the first sights of the Mediterranean Sea?! It's breathtakingly beautiful! It's a rugged and rocky coast, the beaches are dark and kinda rocky with very coarse sand, not easy to walk on barefooted, at least not in this section. The water is an intense aqua and deep blue and just a picture perfect place to be! We seriously thought about canceling the Venice portion of our trip and staying there for another few days. Had our room in Venice not been prepaid, we probably would have!

We walked through the village of Levanto first and then made our way down to the water. We took off our shoes and walked along the beach (for a short distance...hard on the feet lol)....then settled on some rocks and sat there with our feet in the water, took some pictures and talked about coming back someday for a trip here specifically. We then walked up to a cafe that overlooked the beach, ordered some lunch and some wine made there in Cinque Terra. Our guide had said that the wines have a slight salty aftertaste so we were interested in seeing if we noticed it, and sure enough, it did. Kirk ordered a meat and cheese platter and I had some prosciutto and melon, very thinly sliced ham with canteloupe, which I love for that sweet/salty combination that works so well and was, in my mind anyway, just perfectly suited to the moment.

From Levanto, we took the train to Monterossa and walked through the village there and then onto Manarola....most of these sound just like they're spelled, but with a hard rolling r. One thing that was so cute and so sweet while we were waiting to catch the train, is that one of the ladies from Australia was playing with the baby of a couple from Pakistan. I'm not sure whether the parents spoke any English or not, but the baby was obviously too little to understand any, but the lady had her really giggling hard and every single person within earshot was smiling if they weren't laughing out loud! it was just so cute and such an obvious and sweet sign of the commonality of people regardless of race or nationality or any of the many things that divide us. And yes, there's a picture of them. 😊

Moving on, we get to Manarola and walk along the path to Riomaggiore. This part of the path is called the Via Dell'Amore, meaning the Pathway of Love. Prior to the 20th century, these villages were very isolated and getting from one village to the next was very difficult. After they blasted for a train line in the 1920's, they built the path that connected the first two villages...the part of the walk we did. So it became a lover's meeting point for girls and boys between the two villages and the walls and tunnels between became ultimately very heavily graffited with declarations of love. Even the cacti growing along the side has been used and initials and dates are carved into the leaves.

Along various places on the path, you'll see many padlocks (locks of love) placed on the trail and it's become a tradition to add your own lock. I happened to have a tiny luggage lock in my pocket, so we added ours to the many along the way. You'll see that one in pictures too. 😊 Several people have also added papers or something in plastic bags and tied them to the fencing, which does tend to give it a little bit of a trashy look, but there's still something unique and neat about it that kinda makes you overlook that aspect somehow. The graffiti along this walkway was far different than other rebel or gang graffiti we had been seeing. Much has been added to increase the safety of the walkway (which had been closed frequently due to rock falls and mudslides), and it's definitely now part of the culture of the Cinque Terra. I've since learned that the locks of love are also a common thing throughout Europe in various romantic locations.

After walking the path, we load back up on the bus to head back to Milan. So whether or not the pictures will do it justice, we did decide that despite those first hours in Milan, the hotel and any other frustrations, the stopover was worth it for the Mediterranean alone. See what you think when you see the pictures! 😊

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