The weather forecast was a 100% chance of thunderstorms in the Cinque Terre today so we got together our rain gear and took off anyway - except for Yvonne who stayed in Florence for her own day of sightseeing. The two hour train ride took us first to La Spezia where we transferred to the local train for the Cinque (five) Terre (villages) excursion. We first went to the beach resort village of Monterosso where we walked along the boardwalk and beach of the Ligurian Sea (part of the Mediterranean). Back to the train and on to Vernazza where we had lunch, shopped and took photos. These villages are sustained by fishing, wine production and tourism (and there were a lot of us there today!). The towns are also connected by hiking trails but none of us tried them! Manarola was our third and last village (it's difficult to get in all five in one day). It is the most picturesque from the vantage point of a rocky cliff a little distance away, but easy to get to. Most of us had gelato and coffee there and enjoyed our stay. We also "stayed" a long time on the platform to catch our train back to La Spezia as it was delayed by 40 minutes! We made our final connection back to Florence and were happy to collapse in our beds after another great day of seeing the uniqueness of the Italian culture. Oh, by the way - the rain did not fall, thunder did not roll, lightning did not flash, and we were dry all day! Enjoy the photos and stay tuned for more . . .
