Every day when travelling brings with it its own challenges and today was no exception. It was planned as a "travel" day really - simply to get from Pompei up the West coast of italy through Naples and Rome to La Spezia and across to Riomaggiore, one of the "Cinque terra" villages.
Stage 1: Pompei to Naples by train. All OK except the local train was 20 mins "retardo" (late)
Stage 2: Naples to Rome by "Frecciorosso" (very fast) train - all OK and even avoided the pick-pockets and "helpers". Had nice lunch near museum in Rome in 2 hour gap between trains.
Stage 3: Rome to La Spezia by "Frecciobianco" (half fast) train. long (3.5 hr) trip but OK
Stage 4: La Spezia to Riomaggiore (7 minute trip) - had to buy ticket from machine. Problem. Americans (Michael and Melissa from Minnesota on their honeymoon) in front couldn't get the machine to work in English. I tried and it worked so we agreed to buy 4 tickets on my input. Machine ate all the coins we could muster between us and no ticket. Used 20 euro note and thankfully got change and ticket. Still no sign of eaten coins. We then reached the platform just as the train was leaving. Some searching for details of next train but eventually (more upstairs/downstairs with luggage) found new platform and train, left one hour after arrival at the station. Reached Riomaggiore 7 minutes later. Thankfully, Sandro our B&B owner waiting there with sign.
This is an amazing place - built on side of very high cliff with sea at the bottom. More of that tomorrow, but negotiating steps with the luggage was "quite interesting" but got settled in and contacted Julie and David (my sister and her husband) who had also (by incredible coincidence) booked into Riomaggiore for the next few days as well as part of their Italy trip. Went to a restaurant just beside our building's front door with Julie and David for dinner - absolutely beautiful and a great night.
Weather forecast for tomorrow is not good but if walking is off the agenda we can take trains from village to village.
no trivia - yeah!!! - unless you want to know that "cinque-terra" simply means "five villages" in Italian.
pictures:
*Our favourite dinner spot near the cathedral square in Pompei
*Dinner with David and Julie at "Dau Cila" in Riomaggiore
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