when the trains strike and EVERYTHING goes right

We arrived in Cinque Terre, excited about staying in cute little Vernazza. If you aren’t familiar with the Cinque Terre, they are five little towns nestled in the Italian Riviera that you can hike between. We had planned to hike as many of the trails that were open and then take the train between the towns where the pathway was closed.

When we woke up the next day to go buy our hiking pass and train pass between the towns we found the trains were on strike.

We first thought that this would be a bad thing because we wouldn’t be able to do the hikes we had planned—from the first town (Monterosso) to the third town (Corniglia). We originally planned to then take the train to Manarola and do a hike up to Volastra, then hop on the train again to visit Riomaggiore.

Since our plans were foiled by the train strike, we had to reconfigure. Instead, we took a hike to Monterosso to visit the town and realized that the train strike would turn out to be the BIGGEST miracle ever.

Since there were no trains running into the five towns, there would be hardly anybody in the towns except for locals and a few of the tourists who had spent the night there. It was seriously so magical all day.

We ended up hiking from Monterosso back to Vernazza, Vernazza to Corniglia, Corniglia to Volastra, and Volastra to Manarola.

Our lunches consisted of two cups of gelato (oops) but we figured it would be okay with all the hiking we are doing.

As we ended the day, our legs felt like jello becauase the mountains are no walk in the park!!

By far the most incredible part of the day was the hike from Corniglia to Manarola. This hike takes you up into the vineyards (literally through people’s front yards) and the pathway is just stunning. The path from Corgniglia to Volastra was one of the highlights of my day because the vineyards were just so neat to walk through. Additionally, the hike down from Volastra to Manarola was absolutely stunning because of its panoramic views around.

All in all, it was one of the most beautiful days ever! We basically had the towns all to ourselves and felt like we belonged there forever. The only downside to the day was being yelled at by my sister because apparently I hadn’t warned her how hilly the hikes would be. Let’s just say, anytime we were walking uphill, I was in danger of being pushed off the cliff.  Also, at the end of the day, we saw that we had walked 19.5 miles in total… that is a new record for our trip!