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Cinque Terre
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If you haven't been to Cinque Terre, GO NOW!!! We spent a day and a half there and hiked from one end to the other, and it is really beautiful. The main trail is basically carved into the side of the cliff overlooking the Mediterranean, you can't tell where the water meets the sky, but you know that it is beautiful.
A little info on Cinque Terre if you are lost. Cinque Terre literally means '5 towns' in Italian, and it is a set of 5 towns on the Italian Riviera coast on the Mediterranean, 2-3 hours northwest of Florence. The 5 towns are Riomaggiore, Manarola, Cornigila, Vernazza and Monterosso. La Spezia is a bigger town, only a 7 minute train ride from Riomaggiore, where you switch trains to reach the smaller towns. There is a road between the towns, but the most beautiful route is a 4-5 hour hike between them. Parts of it are grueling, and there are times when you feel like you are sweating from every pore in your body. But the pride and joy when you finish is amazing.
We stayed in Riomaggiore in Cinque Terre Holidays, which is fine and can be found on Hostelworld. If you want to stay in town, choose a larger dorm room. The smaller rooms are set up on a hill, 200 steps or so above town (which isn't much fun with a backpack). Manarola and Corniglia are very small and we breezed through them. Corniglia is so small that as we were passing through, there were 3 trucks in the center of town. One was the butcher, one sold household items like toilet paper and laundry detergent, and the third sold clothes. I think that may have been the smallest town I have ever been to. There was also a public WC in Corniglia worth mentioning. WC is Water Closet, also called a bathroom for you dumbies. This WC was literally a hole in the ground, but it was the nicest darn hole I had ever seen. Not only was it immaculately clean, with 2-ply (the good stuff), but this hole had an AUTOMATIC FLUSHER. I mean seriously. The town could splurge for a nifty automatic flusher, but couldn't put a !"·$%&@# toilet in there?? Craziness.
Vernazza, the 4th town, was the nicest and largest of the middle 3 and a good place to stop for lunch. We did, and ended up talking to a family from Green Bay for well over an hour which made our day longer, but it's always nice to talk to Americans, especially when it's been a couple of days since you've met nice people. The last town was Monterosso, which has a beach, which was amazingly refreshing after the long, strenous hike. There, some old Italian guy in a very small White speedo, physically removed us from his 'private' beach because we weren't moving fast enough to leave. We honestly didn't realize it was private. These Europeans are so touchy about their beaches. At home, I feel like more beaches are generally public, but not here. Only the small crowded part is open for the general public and this guy wanted 20€ for 2 chairs and it was already 5pm. Kinda ridiculous.
Anyways, Cinque Terre is great, check it out, but not in winter. And I feel like Riomaggiore is the place to stay, there are a bunch of restaurants, and one bar, but GO SOON, because 5 years from now, I feel like it will be really really touristy. Now it is getting there, but still local at it's heart.
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