Hiking Cinque Terre

Well it all started at 5am! Out of bed and on a crazy 4 hour train ride through beautiful countryside. Every moment of nap was a regretted moment of not gazing out the window. After multiple train switches through crazy terminals all in Italian (and unfortunately not Spanish) and 150 pages through Shutter Island (yeah it's wicked scary) we arrived at Monterosso the furthest town on the trail! Right on the coast the water abuts the cliffs! So gorgeous and so nice to be near the ocean! Sadly, due to landslides the first trail was blocked off so we were unable to hike the 1st of 5 treacherous (ha ok treacherous may be too strong of a word hahaha challenging excursion to nature walk) climbs. Since, Skips was not feeling so hott and had taken some dayquil this portion of the hike was a little intense and well let's say interesting....

However, the views were so beautiful seeing the little quaint Italian towns with sooo much pesto, lemoncello and of course Gelato!!!!!! YUM YUM! I swear the foods and smells of Italy are WONDERFUL!!

We hiked through 3 more trails finally got to a little town which was so picturesque!  Steamy and hot we realized we needed to deal with the major "swack" issues as Skips calls it (I bet it's not hard to guess what 2 words makes that one...if not, take the visual of a 2 toned gray shirt..on side light and the back...well pretty dark :) ), so we dipped our feet in the ocean and did so serious people watching!!!

We finally ventured on the Via dell'Amore which was quite basic in terms of the utilization of stellar hiking skills...but it was nice to just stroll. The entire walk way was strung with locks (apparently a symbol of eternal love- total VOM) culminating in the classic blacked image of a couple smooching!!! :)

We then treated ourselves to delicious gellato SOOOO GOOD before waiting to take the long journey home! We arrived back in Bologna exhausted after 2 train rides (and 200 pages of Shutter Island- SO FREAKING CREEPY) to the dark streets which we attempted to navigate although successfully definitely in a energy-depleted fashion!

What a wonderful place and definitely high on suggested Italian destinations.

Over the past two days, we've gotten to see more sights of Bologna!!! Hiked to the top of the tower (one of 2 which I might add are in quite perfect Italian style as they are both leaning) as well as to the church in the mountains behind the city which we hiked through 666 portocos to get to! It was lovely hike and got to drink some vino at the top (love the cheap but brilliantly tasting wine here def going to miss that- ps trying to bring brilliant back into US vernacular...not sure if that will work out. 

Finally, and most importantly in further news, successful nacho creation happened this evening..yes nachos has transcended oceans and were created tonight in Bologna.. Italy and they were good!!!!! :)

Venice tomorrow!!! More updates soon.

Midge