Sorry I've been MIA. My mom (aka MaeMae) flew in last Friday and we had her back on a plane in less than 24 hours to get her 1st European experience going! So CinquAHHH Terre seems an eternity away!? Of course I'll have plenty of photos to share from my mom's visit, but figure I should keep it chronological and post the rest of the Italy trip before I share the pics from Germany, Austria and more!
So the 2nd day, we took a train to Vernazza (Rick Staves calls it the pearl of the Cinque Terre) and it is indeed cute, but sustained the most damage from the flood/mudslides last fall. They're just getting back up and running, so we wanted to contribute to the economy ;) We started there and hiked to the last village, Monterosso, which is the largest and most "resort-ish" with the largest beach. This is supposedly the hardest hike of the 4 (so of course we chose that one! haha) and while it was steep, it just took a little over an hour and I'd recommend it to anyone. Even with kids 5 and older. Nothing was ever dangerous or tricky. The views were incredible and we were well rewarded with our day relaxing on the beach!
* tip: the beach is very pebbly so make sure and bring flipflops or old school water shoes. We have these keens which were ok for the hike, but not great for the beach bc the pebbles kept getting in the shoes.
We shopped a little in Monterossa, took the train back to Riomaggiore and for a little cliff jumping and settled in for a lovely last evening.
Starting the hike.. looking towards Vernazza.
3 of the 4 Wheatleys LOVE jumping off of rocky ledges. 1 of the 4 LOVES taking pictures of the jumps :)
Do you see how happy, relaxed and sunkissed we look?? I'm telling you.. if you ever move to Belgium you just need to go ahead and tell your hubby you will but with one condition: that you get to fly to Italy about once a month for your sun/beach/happy time!! :)
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