Europe Day 14: Trrraaaiiinnnsss to Italy

April 27 started out a bit rough.  We knew something was off when we awoke to a stationary train in the middle of nowhere and our wake-up call didn't come as promised the night before by our car attendant.  Turns out our engine died and we had to wait til a new one arrived...and while it did mean we got to lay back down for a while (notice I didn't say "sleep"), it also meant we missed our connecting train to Cinque Terre so we weren't thrilled about it.  Once we got going again we observed our first bit of cloudy, gray weather out the windows, which made us all the more thankful for the lovely weather we'd experienced so far.

Once we arrived in Basel, we found out that the next train to Cinque Terre didn't leave for a while so we employed the very helpful Swiss train agent to make the rest of our train reservations for the trip (yes, even though we had Eurorail passes, reservations were still required on certain trains).  Then it was on to Arth-Goldeau, Milan, Genova, and finally Monterosso (the northernmost of the 5 utterly picturesque towns making up Cinque Terre on the north-western coast of Italy). The scenery between Milan and Monterosso was stunning, and I thoroughly enjoyed staring out the window as it sped by. 

We got into Monterosso around 7pm, so we found our hotel, deposited our bags, and stared out the window at our lovely surroundings.  That's the great thing about hotels in Europe - even if the inside isn't that great, the view probably is : ) 

Then we took a short walk through town...

We found Bryan's dream car in Monterosso.  This is about all the streets would allow for.

...and picked a place called Ciak for dinner.  They had fresh fish on display, so I picked one out and they grilled it up whole, then de-headed and deboned it for me at the table.  YUM is all I have to say about that.  Bryan had a ginormous bowl of pasta with clams that looked delish too.

Though the window to Ciak's kitchen

After dinner we set out for an evening walk.  Monterosso, like all of Cinque Terre, is fabulous.  Small, charming, and authentic, with oodles of character.  We walked through "old town" down to the beach, where we climbed out on the rocks.

"Old town" is behind me, and "new town" is what you see across the water.

This is "old town" Monterosso, where our hotel was, taken from the rocks/beach.

Then we saw a path winding up around a hill...so of course we started up it despite the impending dark of night.  What a find!  We climbed up to a church, then on past it to a hill-top cemetary.  Call me weird, but it was really neat...wall after wall of "tombs," each lit by a candle and some with flowers.  Walking through, we found numerous people who lived well past 90, and several stones that dated back to the early 1800s.  All-in-all, it was a peaceful way to end the day.

Heading back down the hill, we took a different path of alleys back to our hotel and crashed after deciding we really like this place!