lifejourneysandplaces: Cinque Terre Trek: My second favorite day in Italy

I am on the plane home as I write. We set low expectations for ourselves for this flight considering the awful experience we had on American Airlines on the way over. But we were pleasantly surprised to find TV screens on the back of each chair with more movies to choose from than one could imagine! Cam is currently watching one of the Lord of the Rings movies and I am getting ready to watch The Book Thief, followed by Twenty Years a Slave. The seats and tray tables are comfy (I sleep on a tray table like no other!) and we managed to get seats together despite our late check in at the airport because we couldn’t’ figure out how to check in on line. So, it’s all good.

This captures exactly how I felt as I turned the corner on the trail to see the lovely Corniglia!

Before I explain the wonder of our last day in Italy, I have to attempt to put in to words how grateful I am that I got to have these experiences. So many people are suffering right now and so many cannot have these opportunities. I don’t know why I get these chances, but I do know that I will take them while I can. God is in control of my life and only he knows when good or bad will happen. So I choose to live life to the fullest as long as I can taking every chance to pause, pray and be thankful for each day that I am healthy, my family is healthy and we are together. I do not take good times for granted because I know that those times can turn in a flash. Life is full of surprises.

So on to Cinque Terre which means “Five Lands”. These are 5 small villages on the Mediterranean Sea linked by train and windy curvy roads where you must honk to let a possible car around a corner know that you are there. The Cinque Terre is an area that I always saw in pictures and thought was beautiful but never really knew much about it. My friend, Michelle, went last year and up on her and her husband’s suggestion, we too decided to check it out.

I am not a big tour person. I like to navigate things on my own. But after this trip I see the value in scheduling a few tours during an international trip. For one, after using a map and getting lost and found again for hours, it was really nice to get on a bus and relax and have someone else take care of me for a day! And second, and most importantly was what we were able to learn from our tour guides. I never would have enjoyed any of the places I visited on our two Walkabout Florence tours, had it not been for the knowledge of our guides.

Our guide for the Cinque Terre was Freddy. Freedy was an interesting dude. He speaks 6 languages, tried banking and mortgage for a while, made a killing and took his money to Europe where he did what he wanted until his money ran out. He did say something about a cousin that actually stole his money while they ran a restaurant together. So he decided to live simply, on what he needs, not wants and he makes very little doing tours. But, he loves what he does and it shows.

He made in incredibly and almost annoyingly clear that this was a trek, not a walk. This would be 6K (about 4 miles) and down hill, which is harder on your knees thatn uphill. He said we’d be moving fast and he wasn’t kidding. I decided to follow right behind Freddy to try to get info from him and just because I was up to the challenge. I didn’t want to get stuck behind the people I knew would be slower.Good choice! I got a ton of info that others couldn’t hear. I got one on one info about all of the greenery we were seeing. He explained how the grapes they grow on the terraces are in canopy form and that old ladies get on their knees and crawl under them to gather the grapes. He showed me wild asparagus and oh gosh, it will come to me later, but my potatoes were seasoned with it the other night and it had a very distinctive taste. Also we saw chestnut trees and learned how during WWII people would grind these nuts and use them as flour for baking. We even saw wild boar poop! The face was fast but I kept up.

Lunch was in the small town of Corniglia. It was a tiny town of about 200 people with a beautiful, nice restaurant that served us fresh fish (mine had an added dead fly that I didn’t notice until later and you can see in the picture….and I did NOT act like an ungrateful, demanding American and request it be taken back. I just knocked the fly off and told myself that the fly could have been there as they were bringing me my food and the server would have knocked it off and I wouldn’t have known) The next course was a traditional pesto pasta made with potatoes and green beans in it. It was not as good as I thought it would be but the fried bread and cheese I had later made up for it. We shared a table with a young couple from New Zealand and had a lovely time!

Next up was the next town by train and I do get them all confused. This is where Cam and I got to swim in the Mediterranean! Changing our clothes proved to be interesting as we found a café, ordered 2 cokes, sat there for a few and then used their restrooms. After swimming (which was amazing and refreshing) we used a towel and made our own cabana of sorts, pulled a Houdini and we were changed. We saw that most people were doing thing so we followed suit. I think Cam thought he was going to die of embarrassment until I pointed out that he never once noticed anyone doing that until I made a point to show him.

We had more gelato and then returned to the train and went on. The next town was a sweet little town where we went to a wine bar recommended by Freddy and shared a table with our New Zealand friends. Of course service was slow so the girl and I went to the place that served the Pane Frite…fried bread pastry with the most delicious cheese inside. It was the same idea as my favorite meal from the other night but this was just in a different format. So the fried bread and wine tasting was fantastic and we had the best time with this couple. I never even got their names but they were really sweet.

And finally we took a boat along the coastline to the last town where we had just a little time to say our goodbyes to one of the most beautiful places in the world.

So it’s time to end the Italy trip blog entries 2014. Feeling grateful and thankful and ready to see my family and sleep in my bed…..for many hours!