04-24 Pisa - Still Leaning

There was some debate when we left Seattle as to whether the tower in Pisa was still leaning or whether they had repaired it. We thought it prudent to check for ourselves. It is still leaning.

Our train ride from Monterosso to Pisa was uneventful and finding the correct bus was easy since we had information from Rick Steves (he writes Europe Through the Back Door series of travel books) to take the "LAM Rossa" bus to get there. We had no idea what that meant but we found a bus sign where he said it would be and we arrived to find the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

First thing to do was pick up our reservation tickets for the climb up the tower. Sometimes in the summer you can walk up to ticket window to get your "climb time" and you won't be able to climb for a couple of hours. I checked the board and there were plenty of tickets available immediately after our 30 minute time slot. Here's our line waiting to go up.

Most of the group ahead of us had climbed down when our group started up. Most efficient. You CAN pass person to person in the stairs but one person has to stop, so getting most of the people down allows those who want to go up to do it more "quickly". Being "forced" to stop though has the advantage of catching your wind.

Amazingly marble is not as hard as you would think it is. Over the years the steps have worn down considerably.

There are bells at the top. Who knew? They don't ring any more though.

You are able to walk around the entire outside of the tower and you can feel the leaning.

The view was blocked by netting so the best pictures were from a lower level. This is the Cathedral.

The souvenir vendors are on the other side of the "keep-off-the" grass.

And then, of course, we had to do the "funny" Leaning Tower of Pisa photos.

And this would have been funnier had our photographer understood that our hands should be touching the tower and to make it look like one of the lovely, married couple was trying to topple the tower while the other was trying to keep it upright.

...and 12 shots later we finally were able to get the self-picture of us holding the tower.

We did go in the Church and the round Baptistry (where the accoustics were incredible). At one point one of the "shushers" (the men who say "shhhhh" to keep you quiet) did an echo demonstration. He would sing 1 note and then follow it up with different note and the echoing would make a chorus sound. Totally awesome sound and it started as I was filming, so I caught it on tape (I haven't found the right words to use for capturing video on SD cards; is it "videoing"; is it "caught on SD card"; dunno yet). He sang from the steps of the octagonal.

Before we left the area, Karen used the power of a single photograph to set the tower straight.

04-23 Three Towns in One Day

Today folks we have a guest blogger, Karen. She writes a journal on her iPhone, so I had her send me her notes and I used my editor privilege and crafted them into a nice story of our day.

We dropped off our laundry 1st thing this morning and headed to catch our train to the last of the 5 towns in the Cinque Terra, Riomaggiore. We had to run a little to catch the train because the lady at the motel wanted to talk to us about checking out and what time were we leaving. She wanted to make sure it was after 8am because that's the time she starts. Then we talked about the laundry and that we were having it sent to the motel. She explained to just put the name of motel and room and she would put it in our room when it arrived. Laundry washed, dried, folded, and delivered to our motel while we go off and play. This is the life. All for $12e a basket. We are doing two baskets.

I finally find a hand made item to buy; a piece of local Slate with a hand painted seahorse and Riomaggiore painted on it; awesome and only $25e.

We get an apple and stroll the streets before heading off on the Via del Amore (the road of Love) to hike around to Manarola.

The Via del Amore follows the trail the teenagers used when they went off to meet up with boyfriends/girlfriends from the other town. It's a very nice hike, especially after yesterday's thigh burner. It was flat and all along the sea. Beautiful views back to Riomaggiore and later forward to Manarola.

We finished the trail about 1 pm and found a take out place with lasagna and took it down to the waterfront for lunch.

Our lunch spot.

Back on the train station at 3:15p and off we go to Corniglia. Corniglia is the only town not on the water. It sits on top of the hill. We get on the bus at the train station, it fills very quickly, and off we go to the top of the hill. It is included on our Cinque Terre Card we bought this morning for $5e each. You have to buy one to hike the trail. The two trails we hiked, Montorosso to Vernazza and Riomaggiore to Manarola are the only trails open right now because of really bad land slides that happened back in October 2011 and November 2011. We were very glad we took the bus. It would have been a long steep walk. We went in a couple shops. All the shops here sell the same cheap souvenirs. Really hard to find anything decent except this one man.

In Corniglia we found a guy who was selling actual photos he took of the area. They were awesome aerial photos of all the five Cinque Terre towns. He moved to Manrola 8 years ago from Milan. He said no one was taking pictures so he started his business. He kept telling us about the different technics he used, how many pixels, how clear the photos are when you blow them up. His English was much better than our Italian but he would apologize when he didn't know the English word for a photography concept he was trying to communicate to us, but since we know photography we understood what he was saying. We bought his CD of over 1000 images for $15e.

We had dinner with a sea view in Corniglia. Pat had sea food spaghetti and Karen had her best pizza so far. It was like at home; thick crust and actual sauce on it. Pat really liked his spaghetti and he said it was the best so far. I tasted it. It was too fishy for me.

We walked around to a view point on the right of town facing the water and then headed back to Montorosso on the 6:23pm train from Corniglia. The guy who helps manage the motel, Enrigui, rushed upstairs when he saw us and got our laundry for us. I thought she said she would put it in our room. Two packages wrapped in plastic. Great. But when we open them and I start pulling things out some things are still damp. Damp clothes wrapped in plastic getting other clothes damp - darn. So we crank up the heat, open the window, and start hanging out anything too wet to pack. Sure glad we bought this close line thing. It is our second use already. We pack and journal and look at pictures. Great pictures. Of course, with the places we are going I might just say that every day. Train day tomorrow. I need to do a little planning so we are ready.

04-22 We Hike UP, We Hike DOWN

The Cinque Terra is a group of 5 towns each build on the hillsides of a valley that goes to the sea. Getting from Monterosso to the next town over, Vernazza, requires traversing 3 or 4 hills and valleys to get there. We knew this going in and yet we still decided that hiking was a good idea. After our "breakfast" in the cafe downstairs we headed out.

We walked over to old town Monterosso and found the trail marked to Vernazza. It said 2 hours. The trail consisted of many stairs up and many stairs down. Parts of the trail were gradual ups and downs like any hike you would find in a park. We found bridges fording over streams. It was just the sheer number of stairs that amazed us. Someone did a lot of work putting all of this together.

We took MANY pictures so the hike took us 2 1/2 hours. The views toward Vernazza and back at Monterosso were postcard-ish.

There were times when we though surely THIS is the final mountain we had to climb since the town looked so close. Of course, we eventually were rewarded with that last walk down toward our destination and the classic "Vernazza in the distance" photo of us.

This town was virtually put out of business by the flood that occured in late Oct 2011. Every business seemed to have been impacted. Since they rely on tourism for most of their income it was imperitive that they get up and running by Easter 2012.

And here is how it looks now. This is where all the mud and debris from the hillside ended up. They are trying to dig it all up and haul it away so they can have a nice functioning beach once again.

To their credit they managed to get most of the infrastructure done and some businesses were open. They dedicated a website to getting the information out about which hotels and restaurants were open. This is the main street in town. All of the water from the hillside runs in an aqueduct under this road. The aqueduct filled up and the water started running on the street. It reached 5 feet high coming down this street. Many of these businesses are still not up and running although they have widened the aqueduct underneath the roadway and repaired the roadway. There were cars floating down this street toward the sea.

We walked around town taking pictures of how the "new" town looked now. We shopped a little bit in the stores that were opening - not too many of them. There were some restaurants open. Karen had spaghetti and I had spinach raviola in pesto sauce (it was delicious).

The seas were very rough (and have been all week) so the ferry boat didn't run so we had to hike back to Monterosso. It only took us 90 minutes this time since we had taken all the pictures that would have ever needed to be taken on the walk over. The OTHER thing that helped our speed back was this sign. It wasn't in Monterosso so I'm sure our shoe selection had something to do with our slowness getting to Vernazza. Once we took off our heels we were flyin'.

Here is a great place for photos and videos of the disaster and recovery. http://www.ricksteves.com/news/cinque-terre/photos-videos.htm

04-21 Day Trip to Santa Margherita and Portofino

We woke up to another sunny day in the French Riviera. Our day trip today will take us by train, bus, and on foot to Santa Margherita Ligure and Portofino, two beautiful jewels that are coastal towns who have no idea what the rest of the world charges for things. They are expensive towns.

We got up early and arrived in SML by 8:30am. We walked around town for a bit and then bought bus tickets to Portofino. Honk, honk, go around a corner. Honk, honk, go around another corner. The road was only 2 miles long but there was more honking in those two miles than we heard in all of Nice. Twisty, windy road with tight turns. Hold on!

Portofino has a Disney connection! Walt and his wife, Lillian, visited here in 1957. This town was also the inspiration for the harbor town in Tokyo DisneySea. Who knew? Well, Karen, of course!

There was a 16th century residence on the top of the hill that we visited. It was open for touring and picture taking of the town below. Location, location, location. That's what they tell you about real estate and this place had it in spades.

There was a lighthouse at the end of the trail and when we got there to enjoy the view there was a cafe with tables and chairs so we bought lunch and enjoyed a nice quiet time overlooking the Meditteranean Sea.

When we got back into town the population had picked up and there were tourists everywhere enjoying the many shops and outdoor cafes lining the harbor. After shopping we headed uphill to catch the bus but on the way we were side-tracked by another gelato place. Here's what $24 in gelato looks like. Thank goodness we just didn't care because it was THAT good!

After our bus ride back to SML we shopped a few places on the waterfront. Finding nothing to buy we headed back to Monterosso (about 45 minutes away) on the train. We walked around the "new" part of town for awhile, checked on where we could do our laundry (we can't, they do it for $12 per basket delivered back to our hotel; score!), and then had some spaghetti for dinner at Il Brigantino, a place that we would recommend...if you're ever in town.

04-20 Big Train Adventure Day

I ride the light rail back and forth to work each day. It's the same train, at roughly the same time, going the same direction, and ending up in the same place. I had to figure it out ONCE.

It is quite another exercise entirely to schedule all of the trains we would need to take to get across Europe. So, today was our first real train apptitude test because we would be on 3 different trains going from Nice, France to Monterosso, Italy.

So I think it was to our advantage to do research ahead of time to figure out what time the trains would run for OUR convenience. You COULD walk into the train station and look up at the board to see if there was a train going where you wanted to go when you wanted to go but you would end up wasting valuable time.

With our pre-purchased EurailPass we can just walk onto any regional train and take a seat (some trains do require a reservation and an extra fee but they are usually the high-speed TGV trains). Our first time boarding had us getting on with a hundred or so other passengers. It was a bit nerve racking not knowing if we would even be sitting with each other or how far away or safe our luggage would be. There were plenty of seats however if we walked on the platform and got into one of the cars at the front or the back of the train. Most people congregate in the middle trains.

We were a bit anxious about WHEN to get off of the train as well, since these people have terrible accents and they are hard to understand! We'll be getting off the train in Genova and there are TWO train stations there. We'll have to listen very carefully for the correct station. There are also train station name signs but you need to be aware and watch for them. Here is the sign a co-worker will appreciate since she is planning on spending a month in this town in August.

By the smiles on our faces I think you can see we're happy to be on the go again.

When we got off the train in Monterosso it was sunny and so was our disposition. We were happy to be at our new destination in the Cinque Terra region of Italy (Italian Riviera to some). Our hotel for the next 4 nights is just to the left of that first big rock in the water.

And there is our hotel on the left up ahead. Our room is the corner room with the two windows that you can see on the bottom of the yellow building. The room is actually on the second floor of the hotel but the road slopes down so you can't tell.

NICE view for 4 days!

Two of the cities in the Cinque Terra (5 lands) had major floods in Oct 2011. The older part of Monterosso and the central area of Vernazza both had 5' walls of water washing down their main streets out into the sea. One of the main things to do in this area is hike between the towns, then visit the town, then hike or take a train back to your town for the evening. We had been watching websites and knew that only 1 of the major 4 hikes was still open. The others were under repair after the flooding. We were happy to find out that another trail had opened since we left Seattle.

Now we had two hikes we could do: Between Monterosso and Vernazza and the other was between Riomaggiore and Manarola. We walked into the old part of Monterosso to view the progress of the town reconstruction and to eventually find some dinner to eat. In this view of the harbor the city looks spectacular. Imagine just 6 months ago when water coming through those bridge openings was almost as high as the opening. On the other side, cars are smashed and pinned against the supports by the wall of water. Mud and debris piled up higher and higher in the harbor. They've really done a remarkable job of cleaning up and fixing the underlying infrastructure.

Dinner was...PIZZA! Ah, we're in Italy. Not your normal American Pizza though. The bread is like toast around the edges. Let's hope they can improve on that later in the trip.

On our way back we found a nice spot overlooking our hotel, Meuble Agavi, which sits just across from the big rock. Tomorrow we'll hike into Vernazza, the town that was damaged even more by the floods.