We recently visited Italy as a family and as part of our tour of the country, we made sure to add Cinque Terre as part of the trip. We did Cinque Terre in one day and hiked as much as we could as a family of four (2 kids, 13 and 8 years old). Here is an example of what we did, and some tips on how to do it. Our trip was in November, so if you plan to go over the summer, the experience may be slightly different than ours.
We found terrible information about the Cinque Terre blue trail hike for November, so I want to share our experience, which hopefully will help you plan your own adventure. Make sure you pack water, snacks and appropriate clothes for sweating (if its cold, make sure to wear layers because you will take off many of them along the way, or if you go in a hot day, make sure you are prepare to sweat a lot!)
We stayed in La Spezia which was nice because we had plenty of food choices, be aware that parking could be hard. Our hotel hosts had an option to add parking to our stay, and I am very glad we did.
1st Town: Monterosso
We woke up early in the morning and took the train all the way up to Monterosso (the farthest North town of Cinque Terre). We bought the tickets at the station and only bought a one way ticket which was 3 euros for adults and 2.10 for the kiddos. We only did this because it was November and we only planned to take the train a few times. Depending on your plan and what month you go, you may want the Cinque Terre pass.
Tip: Make sure you scan your ticket on the green machines before you board. They never checked our tickets in the train, but might as well do it and be safe (you could get a fine if you do not scan it). Also, our trains were on time, i hear that is not always the case, but from our experience the trains all came on time.
At Monterosso, make sure you go see the stone sculpture of the giant, we totally missed it because we went to town and started hiking and totally did not realized that it was away from the other towns. In the town, there are some beautiful sites by the water, Torre Aurora, a statue of a San Francesco petting a dog and a nice playground that my kids loved; so make sure to walk around town and by the trails close to town. The entrance of the the blue trail is behind communal building, and it is marked by a tiny arrow (easy to miss).
2nd town: Vernazza
We hiked down to Vernazza (1.5-2 hours) very steep hike but very doable (we did it with our two kids). A highlight to this part was a local that saw us starting the hike and gave us oranges from their backyard to start our hike. Thank You to the locals! The hike is steep, so make sure you are prepared for that. It is so worth it! The views are incredible! If you are not doing all 5 towns and only want to do one challenging hike, this will be the one to do!
In the month of November, Vernazza had the most restaurants and shops opened but most of the places are closed for the winter. At Vernazza, we had gelato, snacks, refilled our waters and walked around town. If you get gelato just by the entrance of town, the lady there gets really angry with customers from the neighbors shop (fried seafood), so be aware to follow the rules. The gelato was delicious.
3rd town: Corniglia
Then, hiked to Corniglia, another hour of steep hike. During this leg, there is a little spot where people put locks, if you are into that. Then we saw the highest point of the blue path (Prevo, 208 meters above sea). I really liked the look of this super cute town but almost everything was closed for the season. In the summer, this is probably a good spot to have lunch. We stopped in one of the few opened shops and bought some pesto, bread, cheese and prosciutto to eat as our lunch. If you are going to skip a town in the offseason, this may be the one to skip. The train station was a little far, so make sure you have plenty of time to walk to the station. I hear there is a bus from and to the station but we never saw it or even attempted so I cannot talk about that. We walked all the steps to the station (mostly down).
The next part of the hike (from the blue path) was closed, so we took the train to the next town of Manarola.
4th town: Manarola
Manarola was also a small, beautiful and colorful town. We walked down to the water, took some photos, got more water and then started walking up to the church. Be aware, this was a very steep town, so walking around town includes up and down the hills or steps. Since the blue trail was closed for this leg too we took an alternate route and decided to take the 531 route for the last part of our hike to reach the 5th town of Riomaggiore.
This last leg was the steepest of all... it only took us 45 minutes but it was a very hard hike. The views were amazing!
5th town: Riomaggiore
Our last town of Riomaggiore is well known in Instagram. If you ever look for Cinque Terre photos online, it is very likely you will see photos of Riomaggiore. Make sure you walk the Via dell'Amore, for us, it was half closed because it was under construction but we walked as much as we could which was worth it. From the train station or even the blue trail, make sure you walk through the little tunnel to get to town. It is the only way to really get to town, so you won't miss it. The Instagram spot I mentioned is by the wave breakers (by the rocks) right by the water, so you wont miss it. We saw the sunset there and took lots of photos. We were starving after such a long day of hike, so we stopped in one of the restaurants in town and had a nice dinner with some drinks to finish our hike.
Tip: If you saw the Disney movie Luca, i think town in the movie was inspired by Riomaggiore. We watched the movie that same night and we loved that we could relate so much with the scenery of the movie.
The Cinque Terre hikes are definitely a once in a lifetime experience and we recommend it for those that can hike quite a few steep miles in a day (it was moderate to hard hikes). Go visit, try it and enjoy it!
(Below, you will see the photo of the giant i mentioned above, my friend who travelled with me to Italy went to the giant).
Ciao! -Heidi
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