July 2010 - Cinque Terre Trip Report!
Jul 12th, 2010, 04:02 AM
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July 2010 - Cinque Terre Trip Report!
Background
I surprised my boyfriend with a trip to Cinque Terre for his birthday last weekend!
Day 1
Our trip started at Gatwick Airport where we picked up our flight to Pisa on Easyjet. There was a bit of a snafu/technical issue with the plane which resulted in an approximate 90 minute delay to takeoff. My boyfriend and I were entertained by the displays of spectacular air rage that ensued. Seriously people, it’s 90 freaking minutes, the door to the plane is open, the A/C is one, and they’re passing out water. It could be SO MUCH WORSE. I fly Easyjet about 10 times per year and I’m always impressed with the friendliness and patience of the staff.
We arrived in Pisa mid-afternoon and set about trying to get the train. The ticket machine on the platform was broken and the queue to buy tickets was wayyyyyy too long. We decided to get a taxi straight to Pisa Central – best 5E, and decision, ever. The train trip from Pisa Centrale took a bit longer than necessary as we switched at Sarzana instead of La Spezia (my mistake). We had about an hour wait in Sarzana for the next train, which passed quickly over beers in the town square.
We arrived in Monterosso around 8pm and found Hotel Margherita after an easy walk from the train station. We found the hotel to be clean, newly refurbished, and the woman at the front desk couldn’t have been nicer. They upgraded our room to one with a balcony after they discovered it was my BF’s birthday. We paid 160E per night. Breakfast in the hotel was completely typical – a small selection of cereal, meats, cheese, pastries.
As luck would have it, friends of ours from London were on their last night in Monterosso so we were able to meet them for dinner. They had arranged reservations for dinner at one of the waterfront restaurants and the name eludes me. I’ll update with the name once the Amex bill comes through (yikes). This evening marked the beginning of my love affair with the Cinque Terre white wines. Our dinner was very nice, but probably the weakest of the trip. We finished off the dinner with drinks at “The American Bar” on Via Roma followed by more drinks on our friend’s rooftop terrace.
Day 2
For the duration of our trip,I was more or less following the 36 hours in Cinque Terre article in the New York Times:
http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/08/05...l/05hours.html
The NYT recommended the Bagni Eden Beach Club and so we trekked on down to the waterfront to find it like good little tourists. For 9E each, we were given a lounger and an umbrella, but there wasn’t any beachside service like some of the other Mediterranean beach clubs. It was more or less interchangeable with the rest of the beach clubs in Monterosso, although we did notice on further examination that it was much less crowded than the clubs further down the beach. The beaches in CT are extremely rocky, like painfully rocky, and it hurts your feet to get in and out of the water once you have to shed your flip flops. The beach clubs further down the beach seemed to be less rocky near the entrance to the water, which accounted for the crowds. Despite the rocks, we spent the whole day at Bagni Eden and emerged perfectly relaxed and sunburnt.
Our friends had clued us in to a great little wine bar right near the Hotel Margherita – Enoteca da Eliseo
http://tinyurl.com/2ewf3s4
The bar is situated on charming square with great people watching potential. The owners are incredibly friendly and the ambience is just brilliant.
After getting suitably leathered on the great local CT wines, we headed off to dinner at Ristorante Miky which seemed to be one of the more popular places in town. The food was tremendous and the service was perfect. I enjoyed the best gnocchi I’ve had in my life followed by perfectly cooked lobster. The only thing I didn’t love about Ristorante Miky was that we had to sit inside and the atmosphere was a bit stuffy. I would definitely go back for the food alone.
http://www.ristorantemiky.it/page1-en.html
Day 3
We woke up with thick heads and both vowed to try to not consume two bottles of wine BEFORE dinner that evening. Our original plan had been to wake up at 7, leave the hotel by 8:30, and get to Riomaggiore by train first thing in the morning. Our new reality involved oversleeping, waking up at 9:30, walking all the way to the train before realising we had forgotten my wallet, getting on the wrong train (hello Levanto!), and arriving in Riomaggiore around 11. Our plan was to walk the train from Riomaggiore to Corniglia and find the secret beach that the New York Times describes as follows:
“…take the road much less traveled, to the clothing-optional private beach, Guvano, that only locals seem to know about. It's not easy to find: above and to the right of the train platform head down a narrow flight of stairs, follow a brick coastal wall and turn right, until you come to an industrial tunnel with a metal gate. Ring the bell to the left. Someone on the other end will buzz you in. Walk through the 10-minute-long path to a private vineyard overlooking two phenomenal beaches. Pay the gatekeeper 5 euros for your little slice of sunbathing heaven.”
Now, this article was published in 2007 but I figured that the information would still be reasonably accurate. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. The tunnel was slightly more difficult to find than described in the article. A local couple on the way to the beach spotted us standing in front of the tunnel looking for the buzzer. They explained that there was no longer a buzzer but we could follow them to the beach. What the New York Times describes as an “industrial tunnel” is really ½ mile long, pitch black, bat infested hellmouth. The couple had a flashlight and we followed close behind them, but we really should have turned back as soon as we saw long and dark the tunnel was. We emerged on the other side of the tunnel and the couple told us that we longer had to pay 5E AND the lights had been dismantled in the tunnel. So now you are all warned. We were both heavily concerned about how we were going to get back through the tunnel, but decided to enjoy the beach for an hour before officially freaking out.
In my mind, “clothing optional” meant that perhaps some of the female bathers would have their tops off. Umm, no. It meant a proper nudist beach composed of 95% old Italian men. The beach itself was fine, but I certainly preferred the beach club in Monterosso. There are also no concessions on the beach and my boyfriend and I were getting quite hungry for lunch. We had decided that we would try to get my DSLR camera flash to stay on and that would be the light to guide us back through the tunnel. We waited until we were off the beach to fiddle with my camera (seemed like bad nudist beach etiquette to do it on the beach) and quickly realized we had no flipping clue how to do it. There was a small hut at the end of the tunnel where a group of Italian men were playing cards. I put on my best squeaky voice and puppy dog expression hoping that they would give us a flashlight to get through. It turns out that they actually sell them for 3E so were saved. It would possibly be more lucrative for them if they were on the other side of the table, but oh well. We decided to put this experience firmly in the category of "this will make a great story when we get back".
We took the train from Corniglia to Vernazza, arriving around 4. I really wanted to eat at Gianni Franzi, but they were already closed. We found a small restaurant near the water still serving lunch, much to our relief. Totally unremarkable pizza, but we were just happy to have some food and toast each other on surviving our nudist-near-ebola-infection experience.
We jumped on the ferry back to Monterosso, got dressed for dinner, and headed down to the wine bar again for some pre dinner drinks (wisely limited to 1 shared bottle of wine). We booked dinner that evening at L’Ancora della Tortuga in Monterosso. The view from the restaurant is spectacular and we were fortunate to secure a table outside. The food was very good, but not as good as Miky from the night before. I had the seafood cannelloni as an appetiser and the grilled prawns as my main. My big complaint about this place was the service. It took ages to order, to get our food, etc. They sent over a free appetiser, which was a nice gesture, but it didn’t make up for it. I wouldn’t go back here:
http://tinyurl.com/2g3zx4n
Day 4
Back to London! No issues with the flights, fortunately. My only recommendation from the day – Pisa airport sucks so try to minimise your time there if possible.
I surprised my boyfriend with a trip to Cinque Terre for his birthday last weekend!
Day 1
Our trip started at Gatwick Airport where we picked up our flight to Pisa on Easyjet. There was a bit of a snafu/technical issue with the plane which resulted in an approximate 90 minute delay to takeoff. My boyfriend and I were entertained by the displays of spectacular air rage that ensued. Seriously people, it’s 90 freaking minutes, the door to the plane is open, the A/C is one, and they’re passing out water. It could be SO MUCH WORSE. I fly Easyjet about 10 times per year and I’m always impressed with the friendliness and patience of the staff.
We arrived in Pisa mid-afternoon and set about trying to get the train. The ticket machine on the platform was broken and the queue to buy tickets was wayyyyyy too long. We decided to get a taxi straight to Pisa Central – best 5E, and decision, ever. The train trip from Pisa Centrale took a bit longer than necessary as we switched at Sarzana instead of La Spezia (my mistake). We had about an hour wait in Sarzana for the next train, which passed quickly over beers in the town square.
We arrived in Monterosso around 8pm and found Hotel Margherita after an easy walk from the train station. We found the hotel to be clean, newly refurbished, and the woman at the front desk couldn’t have been nicer. They upgraded our room to one with a balcony after they discovered it was my BF’s birthday. We paid 160E per night. Breakfast in the hotel was completely typical – a small selection of cereal, meats, cheese, pastries.
As luck would have it, friends of ours from London were on their last night in Monterosso so we were able to meet them for dinner. They had arranged reservations for dinner at one of the waterfront restaurants and the name eludes me. I’ll update with the name once the Amex bill comes through (yikes). This evening marked the beginning of my love affair with the Cinque Terre white wines. Our dinner was very nice, but probably the weakest of the trip. We finished off the dinner with drinks at “The American Bar” on Via Roma followed by more drinks on our friend’s rooftop terrace.
Day 2
For the duration of our trip,I was more or less following the 36 hours in Cinque Terre article in the New York Times:
http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/08/05...l/05hours.html
The NYT recommended the Bagni Eden Beach Club and so we trekked on down to the waterfront to find it like good little tourists. For 9E each, we were given a lounger and an umbrella, but there wasn’t any beachside service like some of the other Mediterranean beach clubs. It was more or less interchangeable with the rest of the beach clubs in Monterosso, although we did notice on further examination that it was much less crowded than the clubs further down the beach. The beaches in CT are extremely rocky, like painfully rocky, and it hurts your feet to get in and out of the water once you have to shed your flip flops. The beach clubs further down the beach seemed to be less rocky near the entrance to the water, which accounted for the crowds. Despite the rocks, we spent the whole day at Bagni Eden and emerged perfectly relaxed and sunburnt.
Our friends had clued us in to a great little wine bar right near the Hotel Margherita – Enoteca da Eliseo
http://tinyurl.com/2ewf3s4
The bar is situated on charming square with great people watching potential. The owners are incredibly friendly and the ambience is just brilliant.
After getting suitably leathered on the great local CT wines, we headed off to dinner at Ristorante Miky which seemed to be one of the more popular places in town. The food was tremendous and the service was perfect. I enjoyed the best gnocchi I’ve had in my life followed by perfectly cooked lobster. The only thing I didn’t love about Ristorante Miky was that we had to sit inside and the atmosphere was a bit stuffy. I would definitely go back for the food alone.
http://www.ristorantemiky.it/page1-en.html
Day 3
We woke up with thick heads and both vowed to try to not consume two bottles of wine BEFORE dinner that evening. Our original plan had been to wake up at 7, leave the hotel by 8:30, and get to Riomaggiore by train first thing in the morning. Our new reality involved oversleeping, waking up at 9:30, walking all the way to the train before realising we had forgotten my wallet, getting on the wrong train (hello Levanto!), and arriving in Riomaggiore around 11. Our plan was to walk the train from Riomaggiore to Corniglia and find the secret beach that the New York Times describes as follows:
“…take the road much less traveled, to the clothing-optional private beach, Guvano, that only locals seem to know about. It's not easy to find: above and to the right of the train platform head down a narrow flight of stairs, follow a brick coastal wall and turn right, until you come to an industrial tunnel with a metal gate. Ring the bell to the left. Someone on the other end will buzz you in. Walk through the 10-minute-long path to a private vineyard overlooking two phenomenal beaches. Pay the gatekeeper 5 euros for your little slice of sunbathing heaven.”
Now, this article was published in 2007 but I figured that the information would still be reasonably accurate. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. The tunnel was slightly more difficult to find than described in the article. A local couple on the way to the beach spotted us standing in front of the tunnel looking for the buzzer. They explained that there was no longer a buzzer but we could follow them to the beach. What the New York Times describes as an “industrial tunnel” is really ½ mile long, pitch black, bat infested hellmouth. The couple had a flashlight and we followed close behind them, but we really should have turned back as soon as we saw long and dark the tunnel was. We emerged on the other side of the tunnel and the couple told us that we longer had to pay 5E AND the lights had been dismantled in the tunnel. So now you are all warned. We were both heavily concerned about how we were going to get back through the tunnel, but decided to enjoy the beach for an hour before officially freaking out.
In my mind, “clothing optional” meant that perhaps some of the female bathers would have their tops off. Umm, no. It meant a proper nudist beach composed of 95% old Italian men. The beach itself was fine, but I certainly preferred the beach club in Monterosso. There are also no concessions on the beach and my boyfriend and I were getting quite hungry for lunch. We had decided that we would try to get my DSLR camera flash to stay on and that would be the light to guide us back through the tunnel. We waited until we were off the beach to fiddle with my camera (seemed like bad nudist beach etiquette to do it on the beach) and quickly realized we had no flipping clue how to do it. There was a small hut at the end of the tunnel where a group of Italian men were playing cards. I put on my best squeaky voice and puppy dog expression hoping that they would give us a flashlight to get through. It turns out that they actually sell them for 3E so were saved. It would possibly be more lucrative for them if they were on the other side of the table, but oh well. We decided to put this experience firmly in the category of "this will make a great story when we get back".
We took the train from Corniglia to Vernazza, arriving around 4. I really wanted to eat at Gianni Franzi, but they were already closed. We found a small restaurant near the water still serving lunch, much to our relief. Totally unremarkable pizza, but we were just happy to have some food and toast each other on surviving our nudist-near-ebola-infection experience.
We jumped on the ferry back to Monterosso, got dressed for dinner, and headed down to the wine bar again for some pre dinner drinks (wisely limited to 1 shared bottle of wine). We booked dinner that evening at L’Ancora della Tortuga in Monterosso. The view from the restaurant is spectacular and we were fortunate to secure a table outside. The food was very good, but not as good as Miky from the night before. I had the seafood cannelloni as an appetiser and the grilled prawns as my main. My big complaint about this place was the service. It took ages to order, to get our food, etc. They sent over a free appetiser, which was a nice gesture, but it didn’t make up for it. I wouldn’t go back here:
http://tinyurl.com/2g3zx4n
Day 4
Back to London! No issues with the flights, fortunately. My only recommendation from the day – Pisa airport sucks so try to minimise your time there if possible.
Jul 12th, 2010, 04:42 AM
#2
Great little trip you had!!!
We were just in CT two weeks ago as part of a 10 day Tuscany trip based in Florence.
A few difference such as we're probably older, don't drink and live in South Florida so we don't lie out on the beach very much (no novelty).
However, we saw an amazing sunset in Riomaggiore, walked a few of the villages providing great views, took a short train or two and had an excellent, ocean view dinner in Riomaggiore.
We were just in CT two weeks ago as part of a 10 day Tuscany trip based in Florence.
A few difference such as we're probably older, don't drink and live in South Florida so we don't lie out on the beach very much (no novelty).
However, we saw an amazing sunset in Riomaggiore, walked a few of the villages providing great views, took a short train or two and had an excellent, ocean view dinner in Riomaggiore.
Jul 12th, 2010, 05:30 AM
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Enjoyed your report. I would love to live in England, if only for the ability to easily take short breaks like yours to other parts of Europe.
On our first trip to the CT a few years ago we eyed the tunnel to the nude beach and just said no--too creepy. Now that I've heard your experience, I'm doubly glad we weren't brave enough!
On our first trip to the CT a few years ago we eyed the tunnel to the nude beach and just said no--too creepy. Now that I've heard your experience, I'm doubly glad we weren't brave enough!
Jul 13th, 2010, 12:24 AM
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Thanks for your interesting report, especially the tunnel!
We flew Paris to Pisa with EasyJet and also arrived at Pisa airport to find horrendous queues for train to Pisa Centrale so...walked outside the airport and caught a local bus (red I think) for 1E, very quick and easy even with luggage. Trip didn't take much more than 5-10 mins. Then walked from Pisa Centrale to our hotel.
We flew Paris to Pisa with EasyJet and also arrived at Pisa airport to find horrendous queues for train to Pisa Centrale so...walked outside the airport and caught a local bus (red I think) for 1E, very quick and easy even with luggage. Trip didn't take much more than 5-10 mins. Then walked from Pisa Centrale to our hotel.
Jul 14th, 2010, 02:57 AM
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Hi, great trip report & tips! I too am a Cinque Terre fan since I visited a few months ago. We just fell in love of the place! Here's my trip report and the places to eat we enjoyed:
http://trippydoo.com/trip/FloydGordo...e-terre-italy/
http://trippydoo.com/trip/FloydGordo...e-terre-italy/
Oct 1st, 2011, 01:19 PM
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OMG, I wish I would have read your Cinque Terre report before we went. Just got back and we also decided to check out the "clothing optional" beach. We found the tunnel fairly easy, saw a large old italian man walking toward it, but the walk through it was ridiculous. I kept thinking we would get mugged, robbed, raped, etc. Never thought about bats. We used the cell phone as light, but the whole time on the beach, I kept thinking about that long 15 minute dark walk back.
