6/12 -- Transfer to Monterosso, explore Riomaggiore

We packed into a bus this morning a drove a couple hours to a hill above Monterosso. Our 21 passenger bus was too big to drive down to the drop off point in the village, so we packed our luggage and us into two smaller vans, which were also too big to get to the hotel. We got out and our luggage was moved to an even smaller truck and we walked uphill to our hotel.

Our first views of the Cinque Terre coastline

Above/Below: Monterosso, the northernmost and
largest of the villages.  It is split in two -- new (upper
section) and old (where we are staying)

We took a walk around the area (armed with a map, because the streets are narrow and windy  -- pronounced with a long  i) and had lunch nearby.

Narrow streets and a church (below) on the
way to our hotel.

Beach in the old town

WWII bunker in the harbor. There are a couple of them.

Punta  Mesco is on the other side of these grates. It was home
to ancient sandstone mines used to pave the Cinque Terra
streets. It has an abandoned lighthouse and monastery ruins
at the top and also served as a watchtower.

New town beach

We got a lesson on how to use the train station, and then checked into our hotel and unpacked and relaxed a bit before heading out by train to Riomaggiore. You used to be able to take a seaside walk to all the other 4 villages, but the path between the third and the fifth collapsed a couple years ago and has not been repaired yet. You can still walk between all of them, but the upper roads are hillier and much higher. As it is, there is a train tunnel that runs straight between the villages -- about 4 minutes between each village. If you choose to walk, the path is longer and hillier and in theory will take 2 hours per section. We are planning to test that out tomorrow. But today, we boarded the train to the fifth town, Riomaggiore, where there used to be a visible river,  now paved over and channeled to the sea.

We walked down to a small harbor and ogled the skinny houses. Mara, our guide, proposed to lead the group up to a great view point. Jim wanted to see the clock tower (also up) and I wanted to look for pasta and a lighter weight blouse, so we went part way up, then came back to the shopping area, which turned out to be really small. We did find multicolor linguine and another bag of assorted shapes, but the blouse choices were either too expensive or too long and sheer.

Jim and  Mara, our guide, as we arrive in
Riomaggiore

I think we have been eating too much here!

The trains run through tunnels like this 90% of the way

 

You can see part of the collapsed handrail on the rocks.

That rocky finger with the boat is the harbor
breakwater.

After our trip back to Monterosso, 3 couples decided to get pizza and we each got a small takeout pizza and ate at the garden above the 4th floor of the hotel.