WALKING THE CINQUE TERRE
There are hard adventures and soft adventures. By any standard this is pretty soft. The thought occurs as I slip off my hiking boots and step into the shower at the Hotel Porto Roca in Monte rosso. Outside my window the Mediterranean sea and the Italian sky are competing for the prize of maximum blue. The smells from the kitchen promise yet another fabulous meal. After a day of trekking up and down steep rocky trails, there's nothing like coming home to a four star hotel.
Yet this really is an adventure. Monterosso is one of five Italian fishing villages just east of Genoa. Since the Middle Ages they have been known as the Cinque Terre, the five lands. Until connected by rail in the 1930's, the only way to get from one to another was to walk the precipitous path that links them. That is what I have come to do.
"You have to realize that cars had nothing to do with the 3000 years it took to design this area," says our guide, Dave Johnson. "Even today the roads are terrible." But who cares anyway about 5 tiny villages whose chief asset is a handful of row boats? These days, Germans, French, Japanese, Dutch, Scandanavians and Americans washed in on the tide of tourism that decided the Cinque Terre had more to offer than fish.
Such as: a trailhead marked by flaming bougainvillea before it plunges into a deep fir forest. Groves of olive trees where orange nets are spread underneath to catch the fruit as it falls. A sandy path twisting over rocky promontories high above toy boats inscribing toy wakes on a sheet of wrinkled turquoise. And, incredibly, an hour into the walk, an ancient slate barn girdled by grapevines clinging for dear life to an almost vertical hillside. A sign in Italian and German announces, "Our wine!"
We are six of the incoming tide, plus two members of Tre Laghi Travel, an American owned tour operation specializing in Italian walks. Johathan is leading a group around the Italian lakes, but Dave and Donna are all ours. "I love good food," says Dave. "And most of our clients want to eat and drink well. Tomorrow there's a little place hidden in the middle of nowhere where you'll really be impressed with the chef."
But first Monterosso. Which heaves into sight at an upsurge of rock surmounted romantically by the ruin of an old chapel. Yet after an hour and a half of nature at its most dramatic and pristine, to say the distant sight of a parking lot poking into the Mediterranean is a letdown would be an understatement. Even the town behind it, a series of large buildings on a modest slope, is none too impressive.
The Porto Roca makes it O.K. One of the two 4 star hotels in the Cinque Terre, it sits on a ledge gazing out at the sea. Looking west past geranium bedecked balconies where the car lot ought to be is a monastery on a hill. Monterosso, it seems, is divided in two unequal parts. In our 25 percent are the centro storico - the old town - and the 13th century church of San Giovanni Battista. On a small stony beach, bronze bodies are plopped like pats of butter on burnt toast. In a vest pocket park four men sit at a white plastic table playing the Italian version of hearts. Around them are at least 20 observers, laughing, mocking, praising and advising.
"Where else could you see four guys playing cards and 20 more telling them what to do?" says Chris from Potomac, Maryland.
The dozen or so streets of the historic center twist between ancient Italian apartment houses painted yellow, burnt umber, ochre and peach. Stone steps lined with flowering plants lead up to their doors. Bright red tomatoes, deep purple plums and golden peaches wait on the sidewalks for buyers. Restaurants with a few tables in, a few out, bakeries, gelate-rias, enetocas - wine shops specializing in sciacchetra, a local dessert wine made from the grapes on the hill - complete the colorful picture. And balconies dripping with blossoms and laundry hanging from windows and on roof tops, drying in the sun. Bathing suited visitors walk toward the beach, but the sense is that in Monterosso tourism is more tolerated than whole-heartedly pursued.
Dave says, "These people haven't given up at all on their way of living. You see them coming down the hillsides - and they are steep! - carrying huge loads of grapes. Then they climb up and do it again."
A path from the Porto Roca leads to Vernazza. Spectacularly beautiful, Dave says. He neglects to mention until prodded by Donna that the first half hour is a steady climb up very steep steps. The path, hewn out of rock and soil, narrows to a one person walkway. On either side gnarled vines dripping clusters of wine-dark grapes hang onto the slope. Where the trail flattens it is even more precarious, a thin line of ragged rocks hugging old stone walls. A fall would be only to the terrace below, but it is just a little bit scary.
Monterosso disappears slowly as we loop around gorges sliced into the rock. On one side we stop to see, on the other, faroff t-shirtsinching through a grove of olive trees. A puff of wind brushes across,turning leaves palms up in a rippling wave of silver. It is one ofthose moments when physical effort and physical beauty meet in a glorious, heartfelt, "Yes!"
"This is downtown Vernazza," Dave says as we step into a tiny plaza.
"Downtown and uptown," New Yorker George replies.
Vernazza's harbor, in which 28 white, green, red and blue fishingob bo at anchor, is keyhole small. The plaza is the latch and tall Cinque Terre buildings form a three-sided wall. In the place of honor sits rugged, stone Santa Margherita of Antioch as it has since 1318. Local men discoursing mightily pay us absolutely no mind. Women are less conspicuous. One grey haired lady appears on aG othic balcony wearing an apron. Another surveys the square from a fifth story window sill. From above, Vernazza looked impossibly lovely. From inside it is earthy and real like the people who live here.
"This was originally constructed as a restaruant in 1342," says Dave. "What?" "All right, it wasn't a restaurant. But in the 1300's it was a fort in the perfect location to protect the harbor."
From what looks like a medieval dungeon to our balcony hanging over the sea comes fish a dozen different ways: fried, broiled, marina ted, in pasta, on skewers, in casseroles, all fresh and all delicious. When we are able to pry ourselves from the table, Dave gives us the option of walking to Manorola ("It's 2 1/2 hours, tougher than this morning") or training it ("Six minutes.") George and I choose to walk.
"Corniglia is like all the villages were hundreds of years ago," Dave tells us as we climb above Vernazza's final rooftop. "The others were also high on the cliffs with their fortresses below. When it became safe they moved down where they made their living. Except Corniglia." As we've been told, Corniglia is not as attractive as the other Cinque Terre. But that means there are fewer facilities for tourists and more for local citizens. Or should I say comrades? The hammer and sickle of the Communist Party is still displayed prominantly on an old stone wall.
In 15 minutes we are in Manorola. From a distance it is a cubist fantasy, one block of color on top of another. Up close the buildings are quite modern and we have a train to catch so we press on. We reach Riomaggiore just as the 5:18 pulls into the station. 15 minutes later we're back in Monterosso. We'd left it at 9:30 A.M.
"I've never seen Riomaggiore when it wasn't bustling," says Donna next morning as we drive back over crests we craned our necks at the day before. Arriving early, we join women clustering around tiny shops swapping news and purchasing fruit and vegetables that look almost unreal. We hear a loudspeaker blasting and a little truck rolls down the street. "He's selling anchovies," Dave says. Sure enough, women flag him down, he opens his cab and pulls out trays of silvery fish.
Climbing above the rooftops one last time we embark on the final hike of the trip. Again we are treated to magnificent vistas as well as some pulse-raising ascents. But we have a goal in mind, Dave's secret restaurant with the "impressive" chef.
La Luna is the kind of place you step into because it's the only game in town. The town is Campiglia, one of hundreds with a few red tile roofs, an old church and a fabulous view of the sea. It's ours from the terrace where we await the creations of Fabrizio Saccomani. A 23 year old prodigy, he recently returned from two years in New York, which he found completely overwhelming, to the family restaurant where he belongs.
Not all of us agree. The "degustazioni di quatro specialita" include salmon marinated in balsamic vinegar, olive oil and cardoman, a tiny souffle with branzino (a local white fish) and a taste of garbanzo, barley and fagioli stew with clams and squid. This kid is a major talent.
Now his sister and mother bring us tagliolini in a light cream sauce with zucchini blossoms and slivers of the fist-size porcini mushrooms that littered his kitchen counter. Then ravioli filled with branzino mousse in a sauce made from tomatoes picked next door. Since this is only lunch we pass on meat and fish dishes. But a fellow diner, discovering that Dave speaks Italian, says, "This is nothing." We should come back in October to see what Fabrizio does with wild boar.
Instead, we settle for invividual samples of an apple torte, a round ricotta custard drizzled with caramel and a hazelnut torte with dollop of vanilla pudding and chocolate shavings. The price: less than twenty dollars each not including carafes of local whites and reds. "Don't write about La Luna," Donna pleads. "Please."
Amazingly, after this we can not only walk but hike a couple of hours more. That's because we have to work up an appetite for our farewell dinner. We have it in Monterosso after a hot shower, a little lie down and cocktails on the terrace of the Porto Roca. I think we've deserved it after all the work we've put in. As I said, I like adventure but I'll take it soft.
TRE LAGHI leads walking trips in Tuscany, the Cinque Terre, the Swiss/Italian Lake district, the Swiss Alps and Provence, France. Walks are suitable for anyone who is reasonably fit. Guides accomodate guests of all abilities. For further information, contact them at 800 293-1117. Website: www.trelaghi.com.
WHAT TO WEAR: Warm days, cool evenings and the possibility of rain require shorts and long pants, t-shirts, long sleeve shirts and a sweater, a light weight rain jacket and collapsible umbrella, hiking boots, cap, sun glasses and sun screen. Casual clothing is suitable for dining, even in luxury hotels.
HOW TO GET THERE: Delta Airlines (800 241-4141) flies non-stop to Milan from New York City. The Cinque Terre tour begins in Camogli, 20 minutes by train from Genoa. From the Milan Central Railway Station, express trains to Genoa take about 2 hours.
TRAVEL BY CAR: Auto Europe, 800 223-5555, provides cars at the guaranteed lowest price with no cancellation penalty throughout Europe. Especially helpful is their 24 hour toll free telephone number to the American office should assistance be necessary.
