Il Sole La Spezia

We will be staying Riomaggiore (one of the five villages) and have booked our accomodation already at Casa Lorenza  We will be staying in apartment Nettuno.

What shouldn't we miss while we are here?

Partie tot ce matin pour se rendre a monterosso, premier village de 5 dans le parc national des cinque terre. Apres 1h40 de train, nous voila au deprt du sentier qui relie les 5 petits villages. A flanc de montagne, nous avons traverser plusieurs champs de vigne et plantations d'olivier de village en village ...

... to the marina. Cinnamon (the best ever!), Nuts and Chocolate, and Tiramisu were the three flavors I chose. We walked to the water and sat around at the marina just soaking up the long awaited rays and eating our gelato. With the sun finally being out and the hoards of people that marched towards the water it really helped me envision how these little towns must be like in the summer.

We made it back to Manarola in time to watch the sun set over the Mediterranean ...

It's Saturday morning and I'm hitting up this internet cafe on my way through the begining of my day long hike through Cinque Terre.

I left San Fillippo yesterday with happy memories and sad steps. I really did enjoy so much about my stay there that I truly didn't want to leave, but alas my faithful readers needed something more excited to read so I have graciously decided to continue on this path of a new ...

Tuscan Riviera Portovenere
Had seen it on Getaway and looked very pretty.. Found a hotel with sea views and have spent 2 nights here resting , climbing around local castles… eating sleeping and watching the boats go in and out… not much English here but we are not hungry or thirsty so all going well….
Tomorrow we are off to the South of France.. 3 nights planned in Nice.. Really looking forward to it but have loved Italy…

... I get to the Venice blog too J

On the way back to the bus I experienced some more awesome Italian customer service. We were in a hurry to get to the bus but we needed water, so I ducked in to a little shop. I could only see little bottles in the fridge so I asked the guy behind the counter if he had big ones. He said yes so I turned back to the fridge and kept looking. I still couldn’t see them and asked him again if he had big bottles of water. He said yes. I looked again ...

... the *******s were everywhere, in the shops, on the streets, on the boats - much to my disgust.
Our day pretty much consisted of looking through each town, swimming and catching the train to the next one.
We were at the second last town and decided to find somewhere for tea and I found somewhere with Calimari on the menu, it was beautiful and Matt said the stuffed cuttlefish was good too. Finally we had some traditional Italian food which was not pizza or pasta.

... its Gulf of Poets - a beautiful coast part where great poets such as Byron or Shelley would come to write. When u look at the map this part of Italy starts in Lerici, goes to La Spezia, carry on to Portovenere (my private favorite) and then carry on to Cinque Terre. The best way to see all of those small harbours is to get on a farry on a sunny day and explore everything!