We will be flying out of Milan on Jan 19th--would you spend a day or two in Cinque Terre or another Lake town at that time of year?

it depends.<BR>

I just checked on possible reservations at a hotel in Monterosso for February and learned that it is closed from November to March. I looked up only one hotel (Porto Rocco), but you might check to make sure enough things will be open to be enjoyable.

We spent two days in Cinque Terre last week and it was very nice....there were some nice places open in Monterosso, Ciak was a great place to have dinner. Anyway, if you take the train between the cities, you may be able to see them in a day, I'm not sure. BUT I can say, we drove and spent a lot of time looking for parking and walking into the cities. There were a lot of people about most likely due to the holidays and we had to look hard to find a space big enough to slip a car into. The drive between the cities was very beautiful though.

At this time of year, I'd go for one of the lake towns rather than CT. First of all, it can be easier to get from Como (for example) to Malpensa Airport than it is to get there from CT. Secondly, this time of year is rainy season and often several of the trails between the CT towns will be closed due to weather conditions. Maybe that's not the case right now, as Melanie, previous poster, didn't mention whether any of the paths are closed.<BR>