• Home
  • About
  • Traveling Destinations
    • Asia
      • Borneo
    • Europe
      • Austria
      • Belgium
        • Flanders
          • Ghent
      • Croatia
      • Denmark
      • France
      • Holland
        • Amsterdam
        • Lisse
          • Keukenhof Gardens
      • Hungary
        • Budapest
      • Iceland
        • East Iceland
      • Italy
        • Florence
    • North America
    • South America
  • Photography
  • Shop
  • Contact me
Darwin on the rocks
  • Home
  • About
  • Traveling Destinations
    • Asia
      • Borneo
    • Europe
      • Austria
      • Belgium
        • Flanders
          • Ghent
      • Croatia
      • Denmark
      • France
      • Holland
        • Amsterdam
        • Lisse
          • Keukenhof Gardens
      • Hungary
        • Budapest
      • Iceland
        • East Iceland
      • Italy
        • Florence
    • North America
    • South America
  • Photography
  • Shop
  • Contact me
Cinque TerreEuropeItaly

Exploring Cinque Terre – visiting the 5 villages

October 16, 2017 28 Comments

Cinque Terre, which means Five Lands, comprise the five small coastal villages of Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza and Monterosso. They are part of the UNESCO world heritage and we visited them during our last Italy trip. We reached Cinque Terre villages by train, as it is the easiest way to get there due to the very limited parking options once you reach the villages. La Spezia is the closest train station to the villages that is connected to major cities across Italy, including Florence, our previous stop. From there is quite easy to reach all the different villages via the local train.

Riomaggiore

Riomaggiore is the southern-most of the 5 villages, dating as early as the 13th century (some sources even mentioned settlements around the 9th century) and was our base for 3 days. Despite not having any major attractions, this is a lovely town to explore, full of photographic opportunities.

We spent our first afternoon there, visiting the Church of St. John the Baptist, situated in the upper part of the historical centre of the village not too far away from the Castello, built in the 1260. The Castelo served as local cemetery for a while but is now mainly used a a cultural learning centre. There is honestly nothing amazing about the building itself but I still recommend to go there to get great views of the Ligurian sea.

Riomaggiore
Church of St. John the Baptist
Views from the Castello

We then had a snack at Il Pescato Cucinato, one of the many restaurants of Riomaggiore’s main street, Via Colombo. We had a delicious fritto misto, a variety of fresh fried local fish and seafood. A bit salty but quite tasty!

A bit further away, we had a quick look at the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta that was built in the 16th century.

Fritto misto
Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta
Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta

We continued to explore the town, walking amongst the colourful houses and up and down the hills, to get some great views of the village.

Riomaggiore
Riomaggiore
Riomaggiore

We finally went back the harbour, following the “Marina” sign to get the iconic view that made that village so famous! There is not a beach in Riomaggiore itself, but if you follow the path around to the left of the harbour, you will reach some large rocks where you can sit down and watch the sunset.

Riomaggiore
Riomaggiore

Monterosso 

We spent the next day exploring the other villages starting by taking an early train to most Northern villages, Monterosso. Monterosso is actually made of two towns, the ‘old’ town  and the new town connected to each other by a tunnel. We visited the old centre first and had a coffee outside, before hiking the trail 2 that starts in the new town, on the other side of the tunnel.

Monterosso
Monterosso
Monterosso

You have to pay a small fee of €7.50 to use the blue path that will lead you to the next village, Vernazza. The money is used to pay for the conservation of the Cinque Terre National Park which is not too bad. The first 45 minutes of the hike were quite hard as you have to climb A LOT of steps. It is not easy and I had to take a lot of break. The path is winding through olive orchards and vineyards and is offering dramatic views and can be quite narrow at time so you should reconsider if you are really scared of heights. If you attempt this hike, take a lot of water with you, especially during hotter months. It took us roughly 2 hours to hike, with a lot of stops to take pictures.

Monterosso to Vernazza
Monterosso to Vernazza
Monterosso to Vernazza
Monterosso to Vernazza

Once you reach the top, the path is getting flatter and you can start to see Vernazza in the distance.

Vernazza

The views of the coast were really amazing. When the trail begins to go down, the views of Vernazza was really breathless.

Vernazza

Vernazza

This village was to me the most picturesque of all, I really enjoyed that place! The Church of St. Margaret of Antioch that was built in the XI-XII centuries is very iconic, overlooking Vernazza’s small harbour. We enjoyed some food in this amazing location and sampled some of the best gelato we had in these villages.

Vernazza
Vernazza
Vernazza
Vernazza

We continued the trail that would lead us to the third village, Corniglia. The trail starts just above the train station and the most amazing views of the village are within the first 10 minutes of walking from the station. The town is just as picturesque from the back as it is from the front! We continued wandering through some olive groves for about 1h30 before reaching our next destination, Corniglia.

Vernazza
Vernazza
Vernazza
Vernazza

Corniglia

We arrived in the town end of afternoon and quite tired after all that hiking.. it was time for another ice cream 🙂

Corniglia

It is the only Cinque Terre settlement with no direct sea access, but the narrow alleys and colourfully painted houses are really worth a visit!

Corniglia
Corniglia
Corniglia
Corniglia

We called it a day and went down the almost 400 steps to get to the train station and take a local train back to Riomaggiore.

Manarola

Next day we hike from Riomaggiore to Manarola via the 531 hike, a trail that climbs through the vineyards and offers gorgeous panoramic views. It was really steep and demanding for the first part of the hike as expected, but the view were greater than I could have imagined.

Manarola
Manarola

Once you have climb, the challenge is not over! Going up was hard but going down into Manarola was as difficult due to the uneven and not well maintained path and steps.

Manarola
Manarola
Manarola

Manarola is may be the oldest of the towns in the Cinque Terre and very famous for its wine, Sciacchetrà, a liquored wine with 18% of alcohol.

The best advice I would give you if you wish to visit the Cinque Terre is to choose one of the villages as a base and travel to the others. We chose Riomaggiore as our base and I will still make the same choice. It’s easy to travel to and from main cities in Italy and the town has a lot of accommodations and place to eat compare to other villages! It’s not as big and touristy as Monterosso, and still has some quiet and charm (as most people stay in Monterosso).

 

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)

Related

Previous Article Spending one day in Florence

Related Posts

  • Canal Grande and other famous sights in Venice

    June 30, 2017
  • Colourful Venice – Exploring Murano, Burano and Torcello

    June 27, 2017
  • Exploring historic Venice on foot

    June 24, 2017

28 Comments

  1. lesouffleurdemots Reply
    January 8, 2019 at 8:57 am

    Hello je venais aux nouvelles. Te souhaiter une bonne année, en espérant de te lire. A plus

  2. Sidra Reply
    September 11, 2018 at 7:44 am

    Wow amazing post !

  3. Randall Reply
    April 12, 2018 at 3:26 pm

    Beautiful descriptions and photos ~ I’m for anyplace along the sea, and this truly looks like a little oasis. A great sense and feel of a good life to be lived there.

  4. Rudy Reply
    November 16, 2017 at 11:37 pm

    Walk. Dine. Swim. Repeat. So fine there!

  5. Carl Reply
    November 11, 2017 at 10:54 pm

    This looks like such incredible hiking. Such picturesque photos. Love how the buildings just hug the cliffs. Amazing!

  6. Agness of e Tramping Reply
    November 8, 2017 at 1:38 pm

    Cinque Terre is probably one of the most astonishing and picturesque places in Europe. I really hope to get there soon. The 5 villages all seem truly charming. Which one did you like best?

  7. Andrea Reply
    November 1, 2017 at 9:37 pm

    Beautiful trip! That’s a cute pic of the two of you in Corniglia. Italy is still on our list but it seems like Canada keeps pulling us back. Got back from BC about 3 weeks ago, the grizzly tour was the highlight. 10 days and it still didn’t feel like enough nature time. You guys put Banff on our radar (thanks for this!) when you mentioned it and we are planning to go this winter. Icewalk, snowshoeing snowtubing here we come. We love snow and kind of want to see mountains. Glad to see you back! How are you?

  8. tots2travel Reply
    October 23, 2017 at 6:40 pm

    I loved my time at Cinque Terre. A truly special place. Would love to hike it with my boys one day.

  9. Adrian Reply
    October 23, 2017 at 12:15 pm

    Beautiful images Gin!

  10. Anonymous Reply
    October 22, 2017 at 4:12 pm

    looks like a fab walk

  11. Otto von Munchow Reply
    October 21, 2017 at 7:11 pm

    Cinque Terre is quite something isn’t it. You captured some really beautiful images.

  12. Anonymous Reply
    October 19, 2017 at 12:42 pm

    So beautiful places! Colourful and sunny. I hope one day I will manage to see them all.

  13. Sha Reply
    October 19, 2017 at 6:01 am

    Looks like a lot of stairs climbing is required! Good thing there’s plenty of ice-cream to make-up for all the sweating…such a rewarding climb then…I’ve always loved to see photos of Cinque Terre with all the beautiful buildings all around but I guess it also comes with a lot of stairs…haha

  14. Francis.R Reply
    October 18, 2017 at 4:22 pm

    I just adore that there are neither cars nor electric poles… it looks like a very kind place with long days if you live there. Of course inside homes everything has to be quite modern (and that’s) good, even the boats are of the simple kind. Thank you, Gin. n_n
    Francis.R recently posted…About absencesMy Profile

  15. Mabel Kwong Reply
    October 18, 2017 at 9:36 am

    It looked like quite a lot of uphill hikes and steps around Cinque Terre! But those sea and rock views are absolutely amazing! Sounds like you and Le were very fit going up. I’d much rather walk the other way and go downhill 😀 Now I was wondering why at some times Le seemed to be wearing the hood/hoodie over his head? It looked like such a sunny, warm day!

  16. Anonymous Reply
    October 18, 2017 at 6:13 am

    Wow, this looks like a beautiful trip!

  17. Cheryl Reply
    October 18, 2017 at 2:27 am

    A friend of our visited Cinque Terre in 2013. She couldn’t stop talking about it! lol…Your pictures are gorgeous and I understand why she loved it. That trail looks tricky at parts. Bad for the knees I suppose. 🙁 Le’s become quite the poser! lol

  18. Jewels Reply
    October 17, 2017 at 11:25 pm

    Wow, amazing views!

  19. Anabel Marsh Reply
    October 17, 2017 at 4:26 pm

    Wow, beautiful. I have never thought of visiting here but you make it look very tempting.
    Anabel Marsh recently posted…DrumhellerMy Profile

  20. Joy Reply
    October 17, 2017 at 11:58 am

    I adore the Cinque Terre, so lovely to revisit in your post. We hiked in the opposite direction – how well I remember all those steps but definitely worth it for the gorgeous views.

  21. Fiona Reply
    October 17, 2017 at 9:16 am

    Looks beautiful. I had the chance to visit there when I was in Italy back in 2005 but decided to go somewhere else. Every time I see photos of it I wish I’d gone there.

  22. Jolandi Steven Reply
    October 17, 2017 at 4:54 am

    What beautiful photographs. That part of the world is still on my bucket list, but in the meantime, I could enjoy it through your eyes. Thank you.

  23. Anonymous Reply
    October 16, 2017 at 11:15 pm

    Hello Gin, great to see your post today! As always lovely shots 🙂 Hope all is well.

    • Anonymous Reply
      October 16, 2017 at 11:17 pm

      (This is Takami :))

  24. Lexklein Reply
    October 16, 2017 at 10:39 pm

    I’m happy to see that the trail from Monterosso to Vernazza to Corniglia is open again! Did it continue the rest of the way even though you decided to do Manarola later? We loved our time hiking the 5 towns so much, and it was so sad when the Sentiero Azzurro was closed. Your photos are great and really take me back to that lovely place!

  25. Anonymous Reply
    October 16, 2017 at 9:41 pm

    Fantastic landscapes and villagescapes. And the food looks yummy too! Thanks for sharing your trip!

  26. Pierrette Reply
    October 16, 2017 at 8:25 pm

    Quelles superbes photos ! je vois ces images avec beaucoup de plaisir , je suis allée à Cinque Terre voici qq années et j’ai trouvé cette région magique ! Merci pour avoir raviver ce souvenir 😉

    Excellente semaine . Avec mes pensées

  27. Sheket Reply
    October 16, 2017 at 8:20 pm

    How beautiful! The houses are just lovely, and the sea views amazing. I keep wondering what it smells like there 🙂

Leave a Reply

Cancel reply

CommentLuv badgeShow more posts

About Me

I love travelling and exploring new countries. I’ve spent a few months in Galapagos Islands during summer 2011 and that was the beginning of my passion for travelling.

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog.

Follow Me

Popular Posts

Recent Posts

  • Exploring Cinque Terre – visiting the 5 villages October 16, 2017
  • Spending one day in Florence July 14, 2017
  • Canal Grande and other famous sights in Venice June 30, 2017
  • Colourful Venice – Exploring Murano, Burano and Torcello June 27, 2017

Darwin on the rocks – Handmade jewellery

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Copyright 2017 Darwin on the rocks, All Rights Reserved | Designed by Geek Fairy