Today was the long-awaited journey to Cinque Terre, a collection of 5 villages along the coast near La Spezia. It took us 2 trains and about 4 hours to get there. I've not been feeling well, I think it's IBS or something but it kept me up last night. When we got to Monterosso, one of the main villages it was absolutely packed with tourists. They were everywhere on the streets and on the beaches. We had not bought beach attire and we had our hiking boots etc on. We have been looking for cheap swimwear and flip flops for when we go to Sardinia and we found some at a small shop in Monterosso. My swimming costume is far too big, and when I wear it it looks like when Mia and I were younger and we wore granny's old swimming costumes in the jacuzzi! Oh well!
We sat off a rock for a bit then went to get something to eat at a cafe overlooking the bay. We had cocktails and they were the strongest we've had so far! We only stayed for 3/4 hours as it was very hot and there weren't many places to go. It was nice to see the sea for the first time so far.
On the way back the train stopped at the penultimate station before ours. It stayed for quite a while, then a while longer... And longer. We were tired and grouchy and wanted to get back. We had been travelling and on the go for about 10 hours so far. After sitting at this station (about 2 minutes from the other station) for about 40 minutes, someone from Trenitalia came on the tannoy and said there was a problem. We'd already worked that one out! Lots of people got off but we could see that no trains were moving from this station. Fortunately I can understand Italian because they didn't do any announcements in English. They said that there was a problem at the main station so no trains could go there until it was fixed. We looked at the walk to the hotel but it was 3 miles away and we couldn't be bothered! After about an hour the train went to the main station, with us and about 4 other people on board.
Instead of going for dinner we just got a gelato on the way home. As we were sitting in the cafe place, the owner came on his bike and in the basket on the back he had two fluffy white dogs!! People were stopping and taking photos, it was so cute! We knew he was the owner because on the wall was a huge canvas photo of the two dogs.