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.