Last weekend we were given a three-day weekend so five of us went to Pisa for a night and then to Cinque Terre for two nights. The plan was to stay at a B&B with a woman named Claudia for a night and then go to Cinque Terre and stay in a hostile for two. Cinque Terre consists of five cities that total to seven miles and we wanted to hike the seven miles through the five cities. But, of course not everything always goes as planned. So let’s start from the beginning. The night before leaving I could not sleep very well because I was anxious about my trip. What can I say? I am my mother’s daughter. When we got up in the morning we went to class and ate lunch. After lunch, we took the metro to the airport. At the metro we could not really figure out how to use our tickets to get through the gate. How many Americans does it take to figure out how to get onto a metro? The answer is five. We got to the airport and went through security, which for the first time in my life was an ordeal. Apparently, I look like a terrorist because I they took everything out of bag to be searched and found nothing. Also, my jeans would beep as I would walk through the machine and I got patted down for the very first time in my life at the airport. I felt very violated. As for the plane (RYANAIR) is not necessarily as ghetto as people make it seem, but I will say this: They do not assign seats beforehand so you have to fight for your seat. We did not notice that people were piling up their suitcases like two hours before the flight so we were one of the last ones on the plane. I was really surprised that this airline did not double book people because I seriously thought that they were not going to have a seat for us. But, they did.
When we got to Pisa, Italy found out quickly how similar Spanish and Italian were when were trying to communicate to the taxi driver. Surprisingly, it was fairly easy to understand each other. We got to the B&B around eight o’clock at night and we were greeted by the owner/ the sweetest Italian woman named Claudia. She did not speak a word of English, but because of our Spanish she was able to give us perfect directions to the leaning tower of Pisa. We did not get lost once, which is very rare for the five of us. The leaning tower of Pisa is not all it is cracked up to be. It is much smaller than I imagined and I think that people build it up too much. Nevertheless, we took pictures and went to eat outside at a nearby restaurant. This was my first experience of Italian pizza and it was amazing. It is so different than in the U.S. the crust is really thin, the sauce is different, and the cheese can only be described as delicious. After our late dinner, we went back to Claudia’s because we promised her that we would not be back too late. When we woke up in the morning we had the most amazing desserts for breakfast. My favorite out of the seven that she made was a pineapple chocolate cake. The cappuccino that I had at Claudia’s was the best that I had all weekend. After breakfast we walked to the train. We were all really sad to leave Claudia’s she was the sweetest lady and her B&B was very quant and charming.
When we got the train station we accidently bought fast pass tickets that were more expensive to La Spezia. I still have no idea what the benefits of the fast pass tickets were because everything was in Italian. When we got to La Spezia we took a connecting train to Riomaggiore (the last of the five cities). We made our way to the information desk to buy passes for the trains within the cities and to be able to hike. Little did we know this purchase was going to screw us over later. Then we walked up to our hostile and got the key from a tall bald man, who ended up liking us because one of my friends started talking to him about his cats. We walked up the most hazardous stairs I have ever seen up to my home for the next couple of days. When we walked in all I could think was this is such a hellhole. The beds were not made and everything around us seemed questionable so we left faster than it took us to come in.
We walked to the second city and then realized that everything else was closed. So we moved on to plan B. We got on a train and went to the last city and tried to work backwards. The sights were beautiful. On the way we met some truly amazing people from different countries including: Australia, New Zealand, Austria, Norway, Denmark, the Netherland, and a tour group from a different part of Italy. We also ran into a lot of people from different areas of the U.S. and we kept running into someone who we already met in every city. People in Cinque Terre are genuinely really nice and I would love to go there again when I can actually hike the trails.
At the end of the first day in Cinque Terre, we were on the very last train going back to Riomaggiore and the person who checks the tickets came onto the train. We had ridden the trains all day and had not seen anyone check for any tickets (and this includes the trains from Pisa). Out of the blue this guy comes on and starts kicking people off of the train. When he got to us, he told us that we did not have the right ticket and that the lady at the front desk who sold it to us had sold us the wrong one. He wanted to give us each a 50-euro fine and kick us off the train, but luckily for us the train was already moving at this point so he only charged each of us for 5. You could tell that this man hated his job and abused his power.
For lunch on this day we had gnocchi with pesto and it was amazing (it originated in Cinque Terre). The only complaint I would have about this place was the waiter. He put bread on our table and he could speak Spanish so we asked him if the bread was free and if was not then we did not want it. His response that every time bread is put in front of you in Italy it was always free. Lies. We got a cup and bread charge. Fortunately for us this was the only place that this happened.
The first night in the hostel was really rough. We met our roommates who were all really nice. They were all around our age and traveling. Since our room was in the middle of the city we could here everything. I did not really feel comfortable there. In the mornings around five there were bells that rang in the city and the second day when it woke me up I was curious as to how many bell chimed. The answer? 54. Because of the dogs, the people in the streets, the rain, the cold, the sun coming up at 6 o’clock in the morning, and the fact did I did not feel too comfortable sleeping in a hostel, I would probably say that my on and off sleep totally about three hours each night. Taking a shower and going to the bathroom in this place was interesting to say the least. The shower had absolutely no pressure and was a cubicle that did not close all the way. But, at least the water was warm. The entire time I was taking a shower all I could think about was the mysterious corner that had a whole in the wall that seemed to lead to the outside. I really thought a cat was going to attack me since Cinque Terre was full of cats.
The second day we did not think we were going to be able to leave our city because it was raining so hard in the morning and we knew that the trails were going to be closed again, but we attempted to leave anyway and we got breakfast. It stopped raining some and we were able to make it to the third city Corniglia, which was the only one we had not seen the day before. I think this city was my favorite from what we could see of it. We got amazing gelato in this city and pizza. The gelato place that we went too happened to be one of the places Rick Steve’s had been to. I got coconut and strawberry. That night my friends cooked a really good dinner with fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, and pesto. In the morning we made our way back to Pisa to get on our flight. To my surprise the Pisa airport security did not harass me. The flight back on RYANAIR seemed a lot longer and we almost died landing. No joke, I thought we were going to crash into a mountain or a house. The flights must be so cheap because the pilots do not know how to fly. I had a lot of fun on this trip and I really glad that I went on it! What am I going to miss most other than the sights? The food.
No comments:
Post a Comment