Cinque Terre

We arrived in "Cinque Terre" via train from Venice through Florence, La Spezia and eventually Moneglia, approximately seven hours all up. What we didn't realise until then was that our hotel approx 35 kms from Cinque Terre proper.

On the train trip we met an Aussie girl who thought she had missed booking into her hostel. We gave her our details because we had a spare bed. We figure she must have been ok because we didn't hear from her.

Turns out Moneglia wasn't as bad as we initially thought. It is very pretty - we went for a stroll on the beach at sunset and then headed to a restaurant for dinner.

First day we had no sleep in because the hotel walls were paper thin and you could hear the screaming children plus the nearby trains that started at 4am.

Luke set off an emergency alarm in the bathroom by pulling random cord that we thought was the fan. Kinda sums up Italy so far, we think such a thing would have had a sign or be painted red at least, something logical like that. Italians clearly don't share the same views.





We caught the train to Monterosso, one of the little villages actually in Cinque Terre and had a late lunch and partook in some people watching from a cafe balcony.
Afterwards we headed back to Moneglia to have a dip in the sea. Moneglia has beach sand which is a bonus, and the water was quite warm.














We passed on dinner as we went for beers and they had really good bar snacks, even if Nell didn't eat half of them :)

Our next day in Cinque Terre we took the train to Pisa for two hours, as usual it was late and took longer than expected but we got there eventually.
We saw the church, basilica and of course the famous leaning tower of Pisa. We went to the ticket office only to be told there was a two and a half hour wait to climb the tower; with nothing to do while waiting, we decided to pass and just walked around the grounds and saw the tower from the outside.




















We had some lunch then took the two hour train back to Moneglia. Luke played tour guide for some Americans giving train directions on the way.







Off to Rome tomorrow after an emotionally mixed stay in Moneglia, it's a very beautiful, peaceful town, but the hotel was very sub par. The town is much the same as the five well known ones, but there's fewer tourists and less crowded beaches. At least one non pizza or pasta restaurant wouldn't hurt either after six days of nothing but.

Location:Cinque Terre, Italy