Sunday: Doing the Five Villages. We had the pass. We had had bread, jam, cheese, and juice in the room. We were ready to join all the other tourists who'd already headed onto earlier trains. It was after nine o'clock.
As long as we weren't winded, we figured we'd take on the next village. A brochure said it would take one hour and ten minutes. The path was a little more like I expected a path to be. Still, it was not at all difficult in sandals. We found that Corniglia was a hill top town. We walked to the station area right when a bus was due to take tourists to the top. I'm not one to ignore fate. The pathways between buildings in Italy are by now nothing new. I still found them interesting between the buildings nestled together at the top of a mountain facing the sea. It was, by then, after 1:00 pm. We were ready for something to eat. Oh mama mia, a shared pizza was masterfully created before our eyes. We also availed ourselves of reasonably priced gelato. Everybody was; it was warm outside.
At last, to board a train seemed like the right thing to do. The trail to Vernazza would have taken too long. I was impressed with the easily accessible station and the picturesque walk to the harbour. This place had a small beach making it perfect. I'd probably have to vote for this town or Manarola as those I'd like to see again.
We continued back to Monterosso just to make it all Cinque Terre towns in one day. It has extensive beaches but it a little too crowded and new.
Coming back was a bit of a zoo. The train was late in arriving so the tourists got backed up. As it was the weekend, there were many local Italian visitors making enormous crowds today. By the time we got through all five cities were were nearly an hour late. We're back now and have eaten. We even paid for the hotel tonight, so we won't have to goof around in the morning. We have reservations on the train to Naples. It leaves at 7:59 the earliest we've had to be on the road on this vacation so far.