I really don’t even know where to start with Cinque Terre. It was full of so many moments of laughter and happiness that its kind of a blur of smiles and sunshine.
First off – People will say not to spend more than 2 days in Cinque Terre but I would argue you could comfortably spend a lifetime there.
Eryn and I landed in Cinque Terre that first night and went straight to sleep. The next morning we woke up bright and early to catch the shuttle into the first town (forgive me for not even attempting to recall the individual town names) and got started on our adventures!
The first thing we did was have a meltdown when we saw an omelette breakfast shop. We. Don’t. Eat. Protein. In. Italy. The sight of eggs was maybe the highlight of my week, so of course we spent a good portion of our morning feasting over these eggs.
Then we stopped at the train station to pick up our hiking pass and headed off to town 3 to start the “leisurely stroll” we were promised.
Do not go to Cinque Terre for a leisurely stroll. Go if you are training to climb Mount Everest or if you are seriously trying to get that beach body for that special somebody back home. I repeat, Cinque Terre is designed to make softer bodied people confuse tears for sweat and die in a puddle of heat.
Dramatic?
All I could think of during this 2 hour duration was how much I regretted not joining the Cross Fit cult when I had a chance.
It started with a whole lot of stairs. And it was all uphill from there.
We got going and about 35 seconds into the hike Eryn and I lost the shirts and had our skimpy little bikini tops struggling to stay upright with all the sweat on our bodies. We got a couple of looks in the beginning but about mid way we were greeted with the grunts of other women who lost the self esteem issues and were down to their bras and rolled up bermuda shorts.
At some point Eryn, bless her sweet 5 foot frame, panted that she was going to write a poem titled “Little legs, Big steps” to commemorate her time in Cinque Terre.
Don’t get me wrong – I would do it every day for that view. I mean my lord, someone upstairs put a lot of thought into this little piece of heaven on earth. It was absolutely stunning and it was worth every drop that slid down into questionable crevices.
Although we had a lot of ambition (I promise) and wanted to do the 2 hikes in the same afternoon, after we stopped for a short sitting break we decided we couldn’t get up. So we hobbled over to the 5th town where the tourists flocked because of the beautiful beach there. Eryn and I were pretty delirious at this point in our afternoon so we splurged and spent a pretty penny for chairs and an umbrella on a private beach. So worth it.
To summarize this picture perfect afternoon: 5 hours. Shade for my white, white skin. Sand in my toes. 1 vodka lemons. 1 new business venture with Eryn. Perfect water. 1 more vodka lemon for good measure.
I live in Florida, people. That was hands down the best day on a beach, period. I loved every moment of that lazy afternoon.
Afterward we headed back to town 1 where we grabbed some dinner and explored the area for a little while until we had to run back up to our meeting point for the shuttle to pick us up.
We went straight to bed and the next morning marked the beginning of the real adventures!
Running in Rome 