The Blue Trail: Wow wow wow wow?
In which I hike Cinque Terre, struggle to estimate distances, and reluctantly buy a hat.
“How much farther?” pants a woman who is going up the staircase built in the mountain, as I jaunt down the steps.
I am terrible at estimating distances.
“Oh, I’m not sure,” I hedge. “I know it’s slower going up, but I’ve probably been coming down for about five minutes. It’s not too much farther.”
“So, about ten more steps, then?” her companion jokes. We look up at the staircase, on which we can see at least 100 steps before it curves around out of sight.
“Eleven, at the most,” I respond, and we laugh.
The woman wants a more serious answer, though. “About 300 more meters, would you say?”
She could have said “300 feet” and I would not have been able to visualize that either, but in this case, I can wince and say, “Oh sorry, I’m American. I really don’t know how many meters. But it will be worth it up there!”
It is worth it. I’m hiking the Blue Trail (Il Sentiero Azzurro), which connects a string of five towns on the western Italian coast known as Cinque Terre. It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever done, without a doubt.
I knew it would be cool, but, like many things in life that are worth doing, it required me to do some planning and spend some money, which was almost enough to make me say “ehhhhh never mind.” But the weekend before, I’d sat down, looked up how the hike worked and where I could stay, and bought my train tickets. Grumbling the whole time.
According to The Internet, it is possible to hike the Blue Trail all in one day, but some websites didn’t advise doing it in the summer, because it is hot, and the trail can also be quite crowded. But I was staying in Florence for the month of July, and who knew when I’d be back, so I decided to work with what I had. My plan was to bring only a small backpack, stay the night in the Northernmost town (Monterosso), then wake up very early to start the hike, finish in the Southernmost town (Riomaggiore).
There were a lot of moving parts, including three train rides each way and two sections of the Blue Trail being closed, requiring the use of alternate routes. The Blue Trail is around 6.8 miles, but with the alternate routes, my journey would be around 8. Seemed like a lot of opportunities for things to go wrong, frankly. Which is the type of dumb attitude I sometimes have toward even the finest things the world has to offer.
I get to Monterosso in the evening and go to see a few things, including a statue of a giant and some pretty umbrellas.
I also go into an oratory, which looks exactly like a small church and Google tells me is a “small private chapel.” But when I call it a church, someone corrects me. So don’t make the same mistake or you will be totally humiliated, like I was.
The oratory was hosting an exhibit of antique toys. Extremely unsettling to be in a church (church-like place) filled with old dolls and rocking horses, but I adored it.
After the doll exhibit, I decided reluctantly that I ought to buy a hat. I don’t know why I was feeling so grumpy about the hat. I just didn’t want to look like a tourist in my sunhat, but it occurred to me that sustaining a sunburn from neglecting to buy a hat would ultimately make me look even more touristy. It also occurred to me that I am, in fact, a tourist, and there’s only so much I can do to hide it. So I tried on a hat, winced at the sight of myself in the mirror, and bought it.
Then I saw a shirt I liked, but it was 35 euros, which was a little much, so I took three laps around the downtown area to try and forget about it, but eventually saw the store was closing and asked stupidly “How much is this?” even though it had a price tag on it. “30,” said the man. “But I can do 25.” So I bought the shirt, because I can only assume that’s what the universe wanted.
For dinner I had Trofie al Pesto — a traditional dish of the region, and I did not really like it, actually. But I loved sitting there in the charming alleyway with my wine and a book and pretending I have no responsibilities.
I got up at 4:30, ate a granola bar, put on my silly hat and my new shirt and set out at 5:00. I saw a group of people who were clearly still up from the night before, and we waved at each other. It wasn’t blazing hot, because it was still dark out, but the hike began with a big hill, so I started sweating quickly. I regrouped, switching out my new shirt for the moisture-wicking shirt I’d brought and stuffing my hat in my backpack (duh? sun was not up).
I almost died when I saw the view of the next town, Vernazza. LOOK.
In Vernazza, I stopped at a cafe to order a croissant and a coffee. Imagine if all hiking trails had croissant stops? Incredible. Also, in Italy they call them cornettos or something, but I can’t convince my brain to call them that. The woman behind the counter was busy, so I went to the bathroom while I waited. I came out and asked for a croissant. “We need to wait for them to be delivered,” the woman said sternly. “And the bathrooms are for customers ONLY.”
This felt a little aggressive to say to someone who was literally in the middle of trying to order, but I ordered a coffee and sat down. When I was finishing, the croissants were delivered, so I got a pistachio one. INCREDIBLE. I love pistachio cream. I’m going to write a whole blog about the lengths I would go to for pistachio cream, actually, so stay tuned.
I set off to the next town, and saw my first living souls (two Australian girls) on the trail at around 7:40 a.m. — nearly three hours into my journey. Then there are a few others: a couple who exchanges “buongiornos” with me. A man carrying a blue trash bag. Another one running. A couple with a dog off its leash (“You’re not scared?” the woman asks politely, and I tell her I’m not.)
It only really gets crowded in the fourth town, Manarola, which is the prettiest place you can imagine. Not to be dramatic. A guy from Israel asks me to take his photo and we talk for a little bit. I’m thrilled to be having a conversation after such a solitary, beautiful morning. I feel like I’m bursting with the need to say things like, “This is so beautiful!!!! Oh my word!” so we sort of just say that back and forth for a little while.
Israel guy is young and about to start studying data science, though he has “sort of already started.” I do not ask for clarification. He says he likes rock climbing and that he “loves fucking sports,” by which he means he “fucking loves sports,” as in, he likes sports a lot. I think how funny it is that changing the order can alter the meaning so much, and how I’d never noticed before.
The section of trail between the last two towns is called the Path of Love and is supposed to be the prettiest part of the whole trail, but it’s closed. I have already seen so much beautiful stuff today that I don’t feel like I’m missing out anyway. The only downside is that while “The Path of Love” goes along the water, the alternate route is to basically climb Mount Everest, and at this point, the sun is finally shining and it is HOT. I think the only reason I don’t die on the way up is out of sheer stubbornness. There’s a beautiful woman right behind me, hiking in a denim miniskirt like this is NOTHING for her. Like she climbs Mount Everest for BREAKFAST. She’s also at least twenty years older than me. After I end up in front of her during a shuffling of moving to the side for people coming down, then my life goal becomes to not let her pass me until we reach the top. Happy to report I reached my life goal and will now be retiring. I plan to live in Cinque Terre.
I do let her pass me on the way down, though. My knees were so tired at that point, and all I could think about was having a pizza and a beer.
I spent the afternoon in Riomaggiore, the last city. I had my pizza and beer. I bought my mother a souvenir. I read with my tired feet in the Mediterranean and went for a swim and changed into my new shirt. One of the best days of my life.
I feel like this blog is incohesive and full of random tidbits, but if I only wrote about the trail itself, it would just be the word “amazing” 600 times and then a “kind of hot” at the end. So, I did my best.
Recommendations of the Week: I heard this song in a bar in Cinque Terre and it’s been stuck in my head ever since. “C’era una volta” means once upon a time, but this song “C’era una vodka” just means “There was a vodka” haha.
And this classic marinara sauce recipe. I thought I should learn how to make a standard pasta sauce while I’m here, and, sorry, I used a NYT recipe, not a recipe from an Italian website. But it was easy and good and one of the top comments is “I’m Italian and this is so right.”
Questions of the Week:
What are some times in your life in which you were glad you made an effort to do something, and some times you were glad you chose to skip something?
How old were you when you first felt like an adult? What triggered the feeling?
Did you see either of the Pinocchio movies that came out last year, or know anyone who did?
Loved this post :-) - I've done parts of the same trail and the title is very apt! Wow is pretty much the only word for it!
What an epic adventure! I have two questions. 1) Can you please post a photo of the hat and shirt? Inquiring minds need to know. 2) Do you speak Italian or were you ordering all your food in English? Years ago (pre-translation apps), when I was in Italy, nobody spoke English and I had to muddle through with my little pocket dictionary.