[Itinerary Page]The daily diary of a wandering restaurateur
May 22 - Cinque Terre ... briefly
The Cinque Terre may have been an undiscovered back door to Italy at one time, but no more. The train station is only a few blocks from the hotel and as we were buying our tickets for the short train ride to Riomaggiore, the farthest south of the five towns, we watched the noon train pull in and depart.
The trains are about an hour apart, so rather than catch lunch in Riomaggiore as originally planned, we had time to retire to a small trattoria a few blocks from the station where we had some very nicely prepared pasta dishes. Restaurant quality may vary, but I am still of a mind that there is really no bad food in Italy.
You would think that a train ride down the coast would be a scenic wonder ... but not this coast! The terrain is so steep and rugged, that most of it is through tunnels. The train pops out into the sunlight for most -- but not all -- of the local train stations.
There is a walking path that connects the five towns of the Cinque Terre. At one point our plan was to go to the end of the line -- Riomaggiore -- walk the path back a town or two and then catch the train back to Deiva Marina. However, the Via dell'Amore -- the fifteen-minute walk from Riomaggiore to Manarola -- was enough to convince us that it was too hot and the path was too crowded to make going on a pleasant idea. By the time we got to the Manarola train station, the appropriate move was to head for home!
So we had a brief burst of activity followed by another resting cycle! Sounds like my idea of a good time. We toyed with the idea of having dinner somewhere other than the hotel, but finally gave in to convenience. The surprise result was a lengthy conversation ... in French, Italian and a bit of English ... with a couple who live outside Geveva. The highlight of our trips is always the people we meet.
© 2005 Restaurant Doctor