Cinque Terre

We arrived in Cinque Terre after sleeping in the train for most of the trip. When we got at the train station we started to get worried that we wouldn´t be able to find a place to stay. Everyone along the way had told us that you really needed reservations because the hostels filled up really quick. We tried to make reservations the previous couple of days but without a credit card number you couldn´t make online reservations and the long distance phone calls here are extremely confusing to make through pay phones (finding one that works period is a challenge). So when we got there we were sort of worried that we would be sleeping on the rocky shores of a small town in Cinque Terre, and to top things off it was pouring down rain. So with images oVenicece (wandering for hours looking for a place to stay) fresh in our mind, combined with the rain, and the fact that the villages in Cinque Terre are built vertically umountainsns, we got of the train in a somewhat worried state of mind. We stepped out into the rain and within seconds some olItalianan lady walks up to us with an umbrella and said "ostello, ostello, mama Rosa, follow mama Rosa" with some other Italian/English babble. Greg and I looked at each other and said, I guess there's no harm in checking it out, she seemed nice enough. So Mama Rosa leads us to her lair, I mean ostello which consists of many rooms with somewhat translucent walls built into a house at least a couple hundred years old. Mama Rosa led us by the rooms and kept pointing at each one saying "people there, people there", while I kept wondering to myself if those rooms actually were inhabited or whether it was all some devilish ploy by Mama Rosa. I´m not sure what went through our heads, probably a combination of the rain and lack of reservations, but there was a kitchen and the bathrooms at least had toilet seats, so Greg stepped up and said we´ll stay for one night. The money changed hands and a deal was a deal, and Mama Rosa vanished almost as quickly as she had appeared off to catch another unsuspecting backpacker to add to her family ("famiglia, famiglia, we all famiglia"). Perhaps because of the poignant odor of Mama Rosa that seemed to permeiate the entire hostel, we just wanted get out of the hostel and not think about it until we had to return that night.



So after securely bolting our bags to the beds, we left and set off to hike to the various villages despite the weather. The rain let up pretty soon and we soon forgot all about mama Rosa as we enjoyed the awesome hike. Cinque Terre is on the coast of Italy and is made up of five mountainous villages, connected by train and foot paths.







It was possibly the most gorgeous place I´ve ever been. There were a few funny parts of our hike. At one point we were on a mountain that was really close to another facing mountain... face where the path continued. I told Greg I was going to run ahead and he should stay and take my picture. I started running, at which point Greg started yelling "run faster, run faster", at which point a rock reached up and grabbed my foot hurling me to the ground (I tripped). I guess you had to be there, but it was really funny at the time.



Along the way we also came across these crazy mountain carts. Apparently fearless vineyard farmers ride these things up the mountain side to collect their crops. The plastic chair upfront doesn't even have a seat belt, pretty sweet. At one of the villages we stopped and got some paninis. We watched a pickup beach soccer game while we ate.



The players were really good. Then we went to the last village where we got some gelato and listened to some awesome street performers play music, the bassist was amazing. It was getting late so we took a train back to the second village (we were staying in the first) to look for another hostel. The hostel there was booked for the next two days so we went back to the train station along the way meeting two other travelers who were looking for a place to stay. We hesitantly said that Mama Rosa probably had more beds, so they came with us. The next train wasn´t coming for another hour so we decided to just hike back to our hostel. It was a cool hike at night.



We got back to Mama´s to find the gathering place was full of people, we each made a sigh of relief (at least those rooms really had people in them). Everybody was joking about how they had been lured in by Moma Rosa at the train station. We cooked some pasta, talked for a while and then went to bed. We had decided that since we had made the hike (I haven't really talked about how long it was, it was long hike (over five hours), especially with wet socks) we were going to leave early for Barcelona. So the next morning we took a train to La Spezia. At the train station a helpful ticket man wrote us up a route to get to Barcelona using a night train that night. We walked around La Spezia, got our last Italian gelato, and stocked up on baguettes. We then took a train from La Spezia to Genova. Our train to Genova was running really late, and we started worrying that we were going to miss our 16:55 connection to Nice. Some other American backpackers on the train were in a similar situation and we mutually determined that we were screwed because no other trains went to Nice according to our little train schedule book. Our train arrived at 17:10. We jumped off the train and walked quickly to the ticket counter to try to figure out if we could get a refund for our couchette reservation and how the heck we could get to Barcelona. We waited in line for about five minutes or so and then finally got to the counter. I explained the situation to an old italian man wearing glasses and a mustache. He just looked at us with a bored expression on his face and said, "Ventimiglia, 17:17, platform 11". I looked at my watch, 17:18. We proceeded to run to Platform 11. A guy behind us was also trying to get to Nice, and he shouted after us, "do I need a ticket", we just ran, and yelled back, "I don´t know". We ran frantically through the train station following the signs that pointed to platform 11, knowing that this was our only hope of getting to Nice that night, and in turn Barcelona. We crossed paths with an escalator which was miraculously empty of people so we sprinted up it. I turned the corner and I saw the platform and a beautiful train sitting upon the tracks with its doors closing right in front of us. The doors were shut when we were still fifteen meters away. The wistle blew as I ran up to the doors with Greg trailing not far behind and holding on to a sliver of hope, I yanked on the handle. Surprisingly enough the door slide open and without hesitating I jumped on. Greg got one hand on the bar when the train lurched forward. Greg ran along side the train about four steps and then leaped on dropping his baguette in the process. The door closed (almost crushing Greg) and we were on the train cramped into a little doorway with an old Italian man giving us two thumbs up and wearing a huge grin on his face. We just stood there for a moment laughing in disbelief at what we had just done. We still didn´t know if reservations were required for this train, but we were on the train and that was all that mattered at the moment. We put a lot of distance between us and the car we dove onto (not knowing if we had broken some law by jumping a moving train) and we found two seats and sat down for the rest of our trip to Nice. We then took a night train from Nice to Port Bou and Port Bou to Barcelona.

To the poor soul we left behind at the train station looking for a ticket: We extend our heartfelt condolences.