Europe, Summer 2024, day 8, Vernazza is the best

We felt almost an obligation to go and visit at least one more of the 5 “Terre’s” in the QT. After some quick research we opted for Manarola, two towns over. But first…

Breakfast was the same for me, focaccia, egg, fresh mozzarella, prosciutto and croissant. Espresso Macchiato.

The clock tower outside our window chimes every hour and 1/2 hour starting at 7am. Here’s the last 5 chimes of a nine chimed 8:30am. Notice how the last chime is higher, denoting the 1/2 hour.

We got on the train to Manarola. I took a picture when the train stopped in Corniglia so we could say we’d been there. 😂

This maybe says something about our commitment to visiting the other towns…

We arrived in Manarola soon after.

From the train station we walked through a long tunnel to get into Manarola.

It was a cute scenic little town. We walked up the hill a ways and then headed back down all the way to the water. Same colorful buildings with the same touristy food places and shops as Monterosso.

No beach at the water, just rocks. In the 4th picture above you can see a little crane. Looks like the fishing boats (that are parked up and down the street) pull into the little lagoon and are hoisted up to street level. Clever.

It had been around 30-40 minutes since we’d arrived. We stood watching the water for a bit, then looked at each other and decided we were done with Manarola. Good timing since it was already a bit crowded and as we were walking back through the tunnel we were salmon swimming upstream.

Corniglia was in between our town and where we were so we convinced ourselves to stop there.

You can either climb 370 steps to where this town is or take the bus to the top. When we saw the line for the bus, we turned around and went back to the train station. Screw Corniglia. 🤣

I stopped into the little convenience shop at the train station to grab a lemon soda. Inside a man and his son were building an airplane out of cardboard boxes and tinfoil. The kid (around 4 years old?) was very proud of the plane and happy to being doing a project with his dad. Neat.

We chatted with a gay couple from Toronto comparing places we’d been and places where we were still going as we waited for the train back to Vernazza.

We got back to Vernazza and grabbed some focaccia for lunch.

We ate on our terrace watching Vernazza below. It, I think, is the best of the 5 Cinque Terre towns.

I got sleepy after lunch so, with all of the windows open I crashed to the sounds of the bell tower and waves. Cut to 2 1/2 hours later…good nap.

I wanted espresso and Mike wanted gelato so we found a place we hadn’t tried before. I had a Nutella gelato that is the best gelato I’ve ever had in my entire life. And an espresso.

Earlier I noticed the door to the church was open so we wanted to take a look inside.

I love a gothic church. The one was built in the 1400’s and Mike says it looks like she’s had some work done. I’m guessing the bell tower came much later. Still, super thick walls and mean little windows. Neat.

I wanted to go to an online meeting and my regular 8:30am would take place 5:30pm local time so I logged in while Mike worked on his blog. Then it was dinner time.

I’d been craving this since I had a bite of Mike’s last night. It was delicious.

The bread served at dinner in Italy has been…lackluster. It’s become a joke with us.

Dinner was great dispite the bread’s best attempt to ruin it.

Dinner was accompanied by 5 local boys (5 or 6 years old?) running though the square dodging tourists. I kept hearing them yell “Pasta!” At each other for the last two evening while playing. I realized tonight it was “Basta!” Google translate says that means “Enough!” I’ve decided to work it into our lexicon only pronouncing it “Pasta!”

We decided to walk down to the water and take some more pictures.

We headed back up the many stairs to our room.

We sat out on the terrace until it got a little chilly then went inside to work on our blogs and get ready for bed.

We get one more day and night here. It feels just about right. Glad it’s not any less or more.

I guess that’s more than “Pasta!” for now. (Is it working? I think it’s working.)

Good night. Thanks for following along.