A Little Stroll. - He Said She Said

Continuing our He Said, She Said  Series..

I was determined.

Yes. It was my idea. Although I was rethinking my brilliant idea for at least the first hour and a half. Well it might have been more like the first two and half. 

We were in full trip mode by that Sunday morning. Joints and muscles aching, readying for the next adventure and wondering just how much our poor bodies could take without revolting. 

It was a bit overcast, just a slight threat of a storm.  My poor mind couldn't decide it was happy to see the dark clouds which might threaten our adventure or whether it was upset that we would have missed out on another great memory. 

We spent the morning pondering our itinerary. Our sister stayed back in the room while we went to breakfast with her son and daughter in an adjoining town. 

When we finished the clouds looked less ominous and CnC and I headed toward our destination. 

When my sister, nephew and I were in Cinque Terre, Italy four years ago we hiked some of the trails which spanned the five towns. One of the highlights was a pass between our "home" in Manarola and the next town Corniglia. The cliffs stretching out over the Mediterranean gave us some amazing photos. There was a small suspension bridge that we delighted in crossing while noting that my brother, CnC would have loved and would have provided years of nightmares for our other brother Mike. 

When we planned this trip months previously we were disheartened to find that the path was no longer accessible due to some horrendous flooding which nearly wiped out one of the cinque towns, Vernazza and had washed away some of the trails. 

Knowing how much Mark would love some of the trails, I was determined to make sure he didn't miss out. Upon checking on which trails were open, I found one between the towns but was on a "higher" trail. 

So after some questionable breakfast, we took the train to Corniglia. The previous day, Mark had been "caught" filming the bus driver while he was in a serious argument with some of the men in Corniglia. I'm sure that wasn't the reason that when we got off the train, the driver slammed the bus doors shut just as we approached which would have taken us to the top of the hill where Corniglia sat. 

So we followed a group toward the town to start our hike. Unfortunately the group didn't take the road up, they began waking along a sidewalk which ended with some stairs. And the first landing switched back to more stairs, which switched back to more stairs which switched back to more stairs. And.....  You get the picture. 

This was no small number of steps and switchbacks. See for yourselves. Compare the switchback stairs in the center of the picture to the houses and train station below. 

 I kept falling back from this group that was clearly my age or older. WTH?  They even have a name for this torture, Lardarina. Thirty-three switchbacks with a total of 382 steps. 

Mark had been conditioning for our trip to Italy so he was having to stop several times on the way up to wait on his baby sister. And by the end of the stairs, every person in the big group we had fallen into had passed me.   I later figured out the group that had long outpaced me was actually a hiking tour. At least I felt a little better. 

We stopped at the top for a rest and to figure out where the trail started. No, we had not even started our hike yet. 

After several false starts, I finally had placed our location on the map.  Once we found the trail, it led back to the town and we discovered that we could have cut about 20 minutes from our hike we had realized we had walked past one of the paths. 

So we started up the path. 

In case you didn't know, Italy is old. I mean REALLY old. The ancient Italians had to be some rugged ass characters.   They carved out living quarters in the cliffs and placed stone after stone up and down the mountainsides surrounding the towns. 

We started up the stones steps. The lower path, which didn't seem low four years ago took us about 45 minutes to hike between the towns. This upper path actually started to move toward the other direction switching around the northern backside of the mountain before swinging back south for what seemed like an hour. 

Every time I was certain we were at the top of the hiking trail, the trail curved and switched over to climb even further up. I was constantly amazed that some poor soul actually had placed these uneven stones on this path. Now that had to be slave labor. 

And he delighted in every turn.  That same big brother who used to drag me over to the electric fence when we were little and grab ahold so I could get the snot shocked out of me. He was always about 15 steps up and would look around the next switchback and see another section of rugged stones up and up and up. 

He began filming quite a bit of the trip and my unprintable words when I would see we were never going to reach the top. I threatened to throw his camera off the side of the cliffs. 

He decided to rest while waiting for me to catch up. 

Ok, so intense hiking makes me a bit cranky. 

As we would meet people coming from the other direction, we would ask them how much higher the trail snaked. There never seemed to be a good answer. 

After close to two hours we finally reached the summit. 

You can see the lower path taken last time at the base of the cliff. 

The view was amazing. And discouraging. We could see that although we were at the top, Manarola was a very long way away. It was at this time I was wondering if we might end up stranded on this hike  into the night. 

The trail was the nice and level as we hiked at the top of the mountain. However the occasional steps were carved into stones leaving steps measuring about 6 inches by 4 inches. And if you missed the step, the drop was straight down. 

My legs were good and wobbly by then, but we continued on. As we were letting two couples pass, one of the ladies stopped and asked, "Weren't you guys in San Lorenzo?"  Thinking she was talking about a town nearby, I told her no. Then I realized she was talking about the agriturismo San Lorenzo Podere, in Volterra. 

Before going to Cinque Terre we had spent four nights at a charming working olive farm in Tuscany.   The ancient monastery has five or so rooms and serves the best home made genuine Tuscan meals. The couple had also been staying at the agriturismo when we were and recognized us on a random hiking trail, two hours away and several days later. It was one of those odd coincidences that placed us on the trail at the same time and place as our random acquaintances. 

They continued on. At a faster pace than I could. 

About midway of the leveled trailed, we saw a lesbian couple with a baby sitting on a blanket having a picnic. Just HOW you could hike a trail with a baby is beyond me.  I was struggling with a backpack stuffed with my camera and a lightweight jacket. 

About that time Mark produced two apples from his backpack. Since we started the trail at noon with only a couple bites of a nasty fried egg, that apple was delicious. 

As we rounded the mountain getting closer to Manarola, we found ourselves among the grape farms and the workers tending the vines. It was humbling knowing I was just barely able to make this hike, and here are the Italians who regularly hike the trail to tend to their hectares of grape vines. 

About 45 minutes of hiking the leveled area we came upon Volestra, a place where 200 people call home. It was a quaint little town with a small church.   We were literally up in the clouds. 

At this point we began our descent. Rather than wimping out and taking the winding road down we started down some nice long and wide steps. The thing about Italy is that they don't really want you to know just how many steps await you else you may go mad, they create them to switchback, so you never really know when they will stop. 

I later discovered those wide, ankle breaking stony steps totaled 1,100. When they finally stopped we were still considerably higher than our destination. That is where the trail went cold. Along the way we had found red marks painted into the trail highlighting the red trail on on Cinque Terre hiking map. This was where the painted lines seemed to have stopped.

The trail then split with a sign to Manarola and another one to Scenic Manarola. Mark had remembered one of the hikers telling him to take the Scenic Manarola trail, however the trail looked even more dicey than the dicey areas at the top. 

Away we went, not sure if we were going the right way. Especially since the trail was winding around a hill that was opposite Manarola. We finally began to descend again on some carved stone slick steps that were littered with pebbles. At that point I took the camera off my neck worrying if I fell I might fall right on it damaging it and my ribs. Putting it in the backpack again, we started down very steep uneven carved steps. 

About five minutes into it, I felt my feet slip out from under me, sliding on the pebbles and landing on my backside hard in the stone steps. 

As I was falling, I could tell it was going to hurt, but not be serious, as in I wouldn't be doing cartwheels down the mountainside. It must have scared Mark as I could hear him keep saying, "Ree, Ree" his shortened nickname for me as I was falling. 

When I landed my backside and I decided we were going to be sitting awhile while the pain subsided. 

I emptied my water bottle and couldn't believe just how long we had been hiking. 

Once up again we came upon another sets of signs. One to a church and another labeled something I can't remember. We still weren't sure which way to go and I suddenly realized it was a sign to the church in Manarola. 

Just a few minutes later we were on an easy path with just a few steps to Manarola. 

We made it with only a little bruising. 

All in all it was a great hike. I can't say that I would have attempted it had I known that the trail is considered an expert level and that it would take nearly four hours and weaken my poor ankles for a couple weeks. 

Then again, I would go again. 

My pic of the sunset view of Manarola, taken from the lower trail which is open only to a few more yards from this view.

When's our next trip, Mark?

At least he admits to tormenting me. :-)