Some hiking in the Cinque Terre

We had a great breakfast at our hotel and headed out for some hiking. The weather was nice and sunny.  First stop was the office for the Cinque Terre National Park, where we'd get our passes to walk the trails, and our train tickets for the local train connecting the 5 towns. The clerk we talked to explained that 3 of the 4 trails connecting the 5 towns were closed. He said we didn't really need to buy a complete park pass, but since the additional cost was minimal, we did. I explained that we hoped our purchase would help the park complete the work needing to be done to stabilize the hillsides, and whatever else was needing attention. I got the feeling our Italian clerk didn't think like that! Why would you pay more, when you didn't have to!

Marchesa (nice scarf!) and Il Padrino with the beach of Monterosso behind them.

Giuliana (another nice scarf!) and Laura overlooking the beach at Monterosso

Giovanni and Marco headed out to hike some of the trails. Our host at the hotel indicated that one of the trails looked closed, but he said you could duck under the chain across the trail and hike on through. The work crews wouldn't stop, or question you. There are trails along the waterfront (but those were the ones that were mostly closed), and many others higher up on the hills (which weren't closed), so still lots of hiking possibilities.

The other 8 of us took the local train to Riomaggiore, the southernmost town on the Cinque Terre. Marchesa spotted a trail going around a cliff and suggested we try it. 

Looking back on the harbor in Riomaggiore from the trail

A beautiful day to walk along the trail

We elected not to climb the rocky steps to meander through the residential part of town

All of the five (cinque) towns along here have beautiful views from dozens of spots along the lanes, up the hills and around every corner, it seems.

After walking the trail and venturing up the steep lanes of the town, we headed back down the hill for a late lunch at Il Grottino. It was a charming place, with rough stone walls, and the food was good too. Marco and Giovanni ate elsewhere on their hike.

Interior of Il Grottino restaurant in Riomaggiore

After lunch we took the train to Manarola, the next town up the road from Riomaggiore, where Marchesa, Il Padrino and Ricardo stayed down near the water and had gelato, while Giuliana, Laura, Principessa, Caterina and I walked up to the top of the main road and visited the church. The view from the top of the town was spectacular.

The view looking down from the top of the town in Manarola

Inside the little church at the top of Manarola

We hill climbers wound our way back down to the bottom of the town and met the others there. On the way back to the train, we checked with Marco and Giovanni. They were also in Manarola, but at a cliff-side bar having a drink. Some of the group wanted to hike up to meet them. 

We'd already done plenty of hiking in this town, but just had to check out the bar on the cliff.

The view from the bar was spectacular. Worth the extra huffing and puffing up another hill.

The prettiest view of Manarola!

We hopped the train back to Monterosso and had a little time to sit on our balcony at the hotel and have a drink before dinner. The owners of the hotel were very gracious, and provided wine glasses so we could drink the wine we bought at a little store nearby. They also have a fresh orange juice machine out on the terrace. It's a great place to gather and relax. 

Thirsty visitors enjoying the terrace at our hotel

The view of the street below from our terrace

Our host, Giovanni, suggested we have dinner at l'Osteria tonight. The restaurant wasn't far from our hotel, still within the old part of town. On our way to the restaurant, we spotted our host on the sidewalk outside of a bar, having an end-of-the-day drink with his buddies. We all speculated about how fun it would be to have your favorite meeting place within a block of home. I guess it might be dangerously tempting too!

l'Osteria was a charming place, and dinner was good.

Good food, and did I mention charming?

Venice to Monterosso

We hauled our luggage down the flight of stairs to the street, and walked the short distance to the water taxi station at Accademia. The water taxi took us on a short ride over to the train station.

We'd miss seeing the work-a-day boats on the canals

Vaporettos (water buses), gondolas and the Rialto Bridge on the busy Grand Canal

I had booked all of our longer train trips through RailEurope, located in New York. It was very convenient to be able to call and talk to someone in the U.S., rather than dealing with an overseas office and the huge time difference. We were hoping to take the fastest trains between our destinations, so we had to travel during the day. The overnight trains are an adventure for Americans (sleeping in triple-bunks in compartments with strangers), and they take longer too. They can't go top speed in the dark, I guess. And it's hard to actually sleep, so we didn't want to arrive anywhere exhausted by the rocking of the train all night.

Initially, I tried to go through the various country's online booking services, since my research indicated that I should do so when buying tickets for a group. According to the Italian train site I checked (TrenItalia), I was supposed to book our tickets from our departure city's office, in Venice. I used their online request form and got no response. I had the same experience contacting the French train line (en.voyages-sncf.com) regarding our trips there. Finally, I called Rick Steves' office in Edmonds, Washington, and asked for advice. They suggested I contact RailEurope, and once I did, we got all 4 train trips booked easily, and seats assigned in close proximity for our group of 10. I think for individual tickets, or a small group, I could have booked them online without trouble, but we got a discount with our big group, so a bit of work was worth it.

Our train departed Venice at 10:50 and arrived in Milan at 1:15

Luckily, Principessa and Giovanni bought sandwiches at the station, for the train ride, and we carried anything non-perishable from our apartment in Venice, so we spent the train trip passing food back and forth between the few rows where we were seated. We were able to buy beverages from a bar car on the train. 

RailEurope booked all of our seats in close proximity, which made sharing lunch very easy.

After a change in Milan, we arrived in Monterosso at 5:10

We hired a taxi to deliver our bags and a few of our people up the street to the hotel. We're staying at Locanda Il Maestrale, where we stayed in 2014. We liked the location and the friendly and helpful owners on our first visit, and got good recommendations for restaurants then, so decided it would be a good place to stay again.

The owner of our hotel, Giovanni, suggested a great place to go, Torre Aurora, for a drink before dinner. Seating was outside, on a bluff overlooking the Mediterranean, and they served a beautiful plank of appetizers with the drinks. 

Katia and Ricardo, looking as Italian as possible. The Mediterranean shimmered in the background.

We all had a drink, and got 2 planks of small bites to enjoy with our beverages. The food was included with the price of the drinks.

Dinner was at l'Ancora della Tortuga, another great recommendation of our host. The entrance is on the side of a cliff, so it wouldn't be a place we'd run into on our own. They have tables outside along the edge of the cliff, but no outside seating for a big group like ours, and it really wasn't a very warm night anyway. It would be fun to sit out there sometime. The group ordered several seafood dishes, a whole sea bass split by 4 of us, and a few people had pork chops. Wine, beer, some desserts and a few after dinner drinks. The bill was 419 euros. And, Ricardo liked the grappa so much that he bought a bottle to take back to the hotel. It was 90 euros! That's what happens when we're having a great dinner and feeling very festive.

A nice bottle of their own label white wine.

Pork chops with artichoke hearts and fried apples. 

Marchesa with giant prawns for dinner

Giuliana having a taste of something great

After our great dinner, we walked down the hill and back to our hotel. We're looking forward to seeing the other 4 villages tomorrow.

Murano and Burano

After a quick breakfast, we walked over to the water bus stop near San Marco to catch the boat to Murano, famous for blown glass, and Burano, famous for lacemaking.

Marchesa stayed behind since Il Padrino was still asleep, and shockingly, they made it to Murano just as we got there. They started out later than the rest of us, but maybe by only 20 minutes or so. They were approached at the ferry dock by a gentleman hawking free rides on a boat advertising a glass-blowing factory. While our boat took the slow route, theirs made a bee-line for Murano. Il Padrino thought it was likely a scam and that they were going to be taken out into the lagoon and killed. But much to his surprise, they made it! Of course, the free boat ride was to entice visitors to visit a glass-blowing factory, which our friends avoided. We were pretty sure the boat captain was paid to ferry people over regardless of them buying anything.

Laura, Katia and Giuliana on the island of Murano

We ate lunch at the Osteria al Duomo, a place we'd had lunch a few years ago. It's a big place, and the food was good.

Our group of hungry travelers at Osteria al Duomo. Luckily, beverage service was fast!

After lunch we visited a few shops and found some fun blown-glass souvenirs. Then we were off to the boat dock for the short ride to Burano, famous for lace-making. It's also famous for it's colorful buildings.

On Burano, a view of some of our group from one of the bridges

Colorful buildings on Burano

A storefront on Burano

We wandered down the sidewalks lined with colorful buildings, and checked out a few shops. I believe someone in the group purchased not one, but 2 tablecloths at a shop here, and will remember this island every time she sets her table with those beautiful linens. 

When we got back to San Marco, a few of us decided to go see the cathedral. It was closed to visitors by then, but we were able to go up the Campanile. The sign said it was also closed by  then, but they were still letting people in. 

The tall bell-tower is the Campanile

We had great views from up there.

The bell at the top of the tower

The view from the Campanile, of buildings around Piazza San Marco

From the top of the Campanile, looking toward the island of San Giorgio

This was our last day in Venice, so we had dinner out. We tried to go back to Ai Cugnai, but they were full. The owner said we had been lucky to get in on Easter Sunday. He recommended another place, and it was very good too - San Trovaso , not far from our apartment in Dorsoduro.

The entrance to San Trovaso in the Dorsoduro neighborhood of Venice

The dining room at San Trovaso

We had another great meal with wine and a few desserts for the table to share. The total bill was 284 euros.

Then back to our apartment to pack up. We leave in the morning, with many things in Venice unseen. I guess we'll have to come back! 

Carving on one of the 4 posts of our canopy bed. We gave up comfort for history and elegance!

Walking tour of Venice

Ricardo and I ventured out early to get pastries for breakfast. The holiday weekend was over, so stores were back on their normal schedule.

Produce boat along the canal

Ricardo bought some tomatoes from a boat along the canal. He used them to make bruschetta, with some baguettes, for breakfast, along with the beautiful fresh cornetti and biscotti. 

Cornetti (croissants) and biscotti (cookies) for breakfast

Principessa and Giovanni went out to take a gondola ride after breakfast.. 

We all went out for a late lunch before our walking tour and pub crawl. TripAdvisor isn't always accurate, we discovered. A place in our neighborhood rated very high for lunch turned out to be closed, and aside from that, it was only a lunch counter with no place to sit. We had snaked our way through the streets and over the bridges to find it, and were very hungry, besides. On the plus side, we saw the gondola-building shop, famous in Venice. It was across the canal, but still fun to see. We could smell the shellac fumes pretty strongly, so may not have wanted to eat right there anyway.

Gondola-building shop in Venice

We fought our way across the crowded Rialto Bridge, to get to the little square (campo) where we would meet Alessandro for our walking tour and pub crawl.
Not having had lunch, we were all hungry, so before the tour we stopped for a drink at a bar, Cafe Vergnano, near our meeting point. We would have eaten more, but the waitress told us that sadly, there was no food available at this hour of the afternoon. Potato chips would have to suffice. Cheerful travelers all, we felt revived by the meager repast.

Eight of the ten of us, getting a drink and some chips before the walking tour.

Our meeting place for the walking tour, in Campo Giacomo, in front of the San Giacomo di Rialto church

Our Walking Tour started at 4:30, with Alessandro (alessandro@schezzini.it). He was recommended in Rick Steves' guide book on Italy, and also his Venice city guide. There are lots of reviews of Alessandro's "offbeat" tours on TripAdvisor too. Most reviewers enjoyed his commentary and introduction to the San Polo area, and also his pub crawl. We all agreed that he was entertaining, and introduced us to some elements of Venice we wouldn't have found on our own, and at a leisurely pace. The offbeat tour was 20 euros per person for about 1-1/2 hours, and the pub crawl, which included wine and food, was 35 euros per person, and took about 2 hours.

Our group of 10 were the only customers for his walking tour. We walked through little scenic streets, and along canals. He told us that "calle" means street in Spanish and Venetian, and in Venice is used to name streets that were built where canals had been. "Campo" means square, and the surface of each square slopes gently toward drain holes in the middle where rain water for the city was collected and stored in cisterns, then filtered through sand before using it in local homes and businesses. These cisterns were in use for centuries.
We saw some great palazzos along the Grand Canal, and a surprising sculpture. 

Two gigantic hands coming out of the water and supporting the building

We all thought this sculpture was very fun, but Alessandro said it isn't admired by the Venetians! He mentioned that the island has been a tourist destination for centuries, and though the crowds are tiresome, and prices are too high for the locals, tourism is what keeps the city alive. He said Venice currently gets about 25 million visitors per year. 

We walked down very picturesque calles, and had lots of photo ops.

A great picture around every corner

Alessandro told us about the culture of the gondolas and the gondoliers. There are about 400 licensed gondolas in Venice, in addition to the many private boats plying the canals. But, there were 8,000 - 10,000 gondolas during the 17th and 18th centuries. They were mostly to carry tourists, even then. The cost is currently 38,000 euros to buy a gondola. There is only 1 female gondolier, her father and grandfather having both been gondoliers, and a gondolier can earn up to $150,000 per year. I think it's interesting that with so many gondolas on the water, we never saw very many in one area. 

For the pub crawl, we were joined by 8 other people. We stopped at 3 different bars, and were served wine and a few cicchetti - little appetizers, like tapas. The wine and cicchetti were simple, but the experience was fun. We had tried to visit a "bacari" (typical Venetian bar) on our last trip, and couldn't even get in the door, the place was so crowded, so having a guide take us around was a nice low-stress way to experience this very Venetian custom. We bid arrivederci to Alessandro and the other pub crawlers, and agreed we'd had a fun experience with both the Offbeat Tour and the Pub Crawl.

We were still hungry for dinner after the little bites of food we'd had during the pub crawl, so found another place in our neighborhood to eat.  Though we had to split up into two groups at Agli Alboretti, we all enjoyed a tasty meal. Giuliana had a fun dessert with a crispy meringue "roof" over lemon sorbet. Dinner for the 10 of us was 306 euros, and that included 4 bottles of wine and desserts for most of the group. Tipping in Italy is a little mystifying. I've read so many times that tipping is not necessary in Italy. No tip. Nothing. Nada. Waiters are paid a good wage and don't need tips to supplement a meager salary, like they would in the U.S. Some writers say if the service is exceptional maybe round up your bill and leave a few euros in cash for the server. We always left a tip, and always in cash, but nowhere near what we would leave in the U.S.

Agli Alboretti Restaurant in Dorsoduro, Venice

Inside of Agli Alboretti Restaurant

A favorite sculpture along our walking tour route. I don't know what the inscription says, but we can probably guess!

Doges Palace tour

When we woke up today, we were in Italy. And for some, it was the very first time ever!

First things first, so Ricardo was up and out the door early, in search of breakfast provisions. We used our phone to map out the location of some stores, and then walked along canals and over bridges to find them.

Ricardo's first sojourn in the Dorsoduro neighborhood of Venice. 

He found a bakery open, but the little grocery store near it was closed. He bought a few bags of rolls and pastries to give us energy for our first day.

I scheduled a tour of the Doge's Palace for 11:30, thinking it would be good to start our first day a little later, allowing for the late arrival and jet lag of all concerned. Ricardo and I went ahead to pick up the tickets for the group. The others left our apartment in smaller groups, and though the distance to the palace wasn't very far, as the crow flies, there were a few different ways to get there through the winding lanes. Some of our fellow travelers arrived a bit out of breath, not having found the most direct route. 

I read about the Secret Itineraries Tour of the Doge's Palace, and the reviews made me think it might be more fun than the normal tour. I booked the tickets ahead of time, and when we arrived, the line for the Secret Itineraries Tour was far shorter than the line to take the regular tour. That was one of the advantages, according to reviewers. This was busy Easter Monday, after all, and there were hoards of people everywhere.

Piazza San Marco on Easter Monday

The Palace was the seat of government for the Venetian empire for several centuries. The doge, or duke, lived in the palace, and worked there as well. Some of the rooms were very opulent, and works by many prominent artists still decorate those areas of the palace. Also contained in the palace were many offices, showy meeting rooms and courtrooms.

Doge's Palace, Higher Council Hall
from Italy Guides.it

Next door was the prison, where the families of the prisoners were allowed to provide some of the comforts of home, such as furniture, bedding, clothing, and also food. So, some prisoners lived in relative comfort, and some barely survived their incarceration. One of the most poignant parts of the palace was the Bridge of Sighs, which afforded one last view of the beautiful lagoon as prisoners were escorted from the courtroom to their dark and dank prison cells, or worse, to await execution.

Peek-a-boo view through the side of the Bridge of Sighs 

After our tour we went to a nearby restaurant, Trattoria Leoncini, that Caterina and Marco had visited the day before. We had a good lunch there - lots of pizzas - and some of us had our first Aperol Spritz of the trip. Its bright orange color might have put us off, but having tried this drink on our previous visit to Italy, we were already fans of it. This would be the first of several over the next weeks!

Il Padrino enjoying an Aperol Spritz

Giuliana, Laura, Marco, Principessa and Giovanni walked back to the apartment together and stopped for a drink along the way.

Meanwhile, Ricardo and Il Padrino picked up groceries for dinner on their way home. The grocery stores seemed to be open by this time of the day. Carrying the groceries is a Herculean effort here, considering the number of wine and beer bottles for a party of 10 included in any trip to the store, and the narrow sidewalks and little bridges to cross. The men made it back to the apartment in good order, no beverage being sacrificed to the canals. 

Ricardo fixed ravioli for dinner at the house. We had cheese and bread, and some pastries for dessert. After dinner we went out for a walk along the shore of Dorsoduro opposite the Grand Canal, surprised at how narrow the little finger of land was. 



The lights of Guidecca twinkled across the lagoon. 

Arriving in Venice

We flew into Venice, where we'll stay for 4 nights, and in daylight it was spectacular from the air. The Island of Venice itself doesn’t seem very big from up there, and there seems to be lots of farmland on the mainland nearby. 

Venice from the air

The airport is a very manageable size, and getting through it took only a few minutes. The airport is a boat or bus ride from the city, and then a connection to another boat, or possibly a walk through the narrow streets and over the little bridges to our apartment. Since there were 6 of us arriving at the same time, we elected to hire a water taxi to take us right to our apartment near the Accademia bridge. We exited the airport building and walked out to the pier, where water taxis were waiting. The weather was nice, and even with some choppy water, we were in the city and on the Grand Canal in just a few minutes. The private water taxi cost about 20 euros each, 120 euros total, so it would have been a splurge if we hadn't had 6 people splitting it.

Our water taxi navigating the Grand Canal

The write-up for our rental indicated that we had direct access from the Grand Canal into a private courtyard for our building. Nonetheless, our water-taxi driver let us off at the Accademia vaporetto (water bus) stop, which was very close to our place. We arrived at about 5:30. Caterina and Marco had arrived the day before so they could attend Easter Sunday Mass at St. Mark's, and had stayed in a hotel for their first night. They were at the apartment to check us in at 4, then waited at a nearby bar for our arrival.

The neighborhoods of Venice. We're staying in Dorsoduro

Since it was Easter Sunday, my fear was that the stores would all be closed and we wouldn’t be able to get groceries. I put a question out on the TripAdvisor Forum for Venice, and got some good input from people more knowledgeable about the situation. All the responses indicated that not only would the grocery stores be closed this late on Easter Sunday (or any Sunday, really), but that Easter Monday was also a holiday, so there might be closures then too. OK, so we packed some coffee, tea, and oatmeal, just in case. The other dilemma was that we might need some dinner, but I hated to reserve a big table on Easter Sunday in case our group was too jet-lagged to stay up and go out to eat at a restaurant. 

We got to our apartment, and sorted ourselves and our stuff into bedrooms. My goal for this trip was to find rentals with 5 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms, and this apartment met the criteria. It’s a fairly big place, in an old palazzo, with a modern kitchen and big table that seated all 10 of us. The entry (back door, I guess) was kind of convoluted, through a very nondescript door, up a narrow staircase, around a corner, over a threshold and across a tiny landing, and around another corner to the door. I wondered if there might be a nicer entrance from the courtyard, but it was off-limits to us, if there was. 

Once we got settled we decided that we were all hungry, and we headed out to find dinner. The neighborhood had lots of possibilities.

A little canal in our neighborhood of Dorsoduro

We stopped at Ai Cugnai, which we were able to check out on TripAdvisor, and asked about a table for the 8 of us. We lucked out and got seated, and the food was great. Giuliana remembers having spaghetti carbonara, which she pronounced delicious. The bill for 8 of us was 168 euros.

We went back to our apartment, enjoying the little lanes and lights of our Dorsoduro neighborhood. It looked like a place we would be very comfortable.

Principessa and Giovanni arrived at 1:00 a.m., and Caterina and Marco stayed awake to let them in.

Here We Go Again - Italy/France 2018

Here's the travel group in Venice, along with our Walking Tour guide, Alessandro, on the far left. 

We're just about ready to head out on another European adventure. Once again, planning started almost a year ago. This time, there will be 10 co-conspirators, so finding rentals with enough space was tricky. The itinerary takes in some of the biggies - Venice, Nice and Paris, and also includes some smaller towns - Monterosso, in the Cinque Terre in Italy, and towns in the Loire, the Dordogne, Carcassonne and Provence.

Here's our itinerary:
Fly into Venice
4 nights in Venice
Train to the Cinque Terre
3 nights in Monterosso
Train to Nice
4 nights in Nice
Train to Paris
5 nights in Paris
One couple flies home from Paris
Pick up cars outside Paris
1 night in Bourges
2 nights in Ligre, in the Loire
4 travelers return to Paris and fly home
3 nights in Sarlat, in the Dordogne
1 night in Carcassonne
4 nights in Sablet, in Provence
1 night in Aix-en-Provence
Fly home from Marseilles



Here's what the planning encompassed:

Flights into Venice, and flights home from either Paris or Marseilles. Everyone was on their own to figure this part out. Some were booking with Frequent Flier Miles, necessitating early planning.

Apartments for 10 in Venice, Nice and Paris. My goal was to find places with 5 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms, in the interest of expedient morning prep.

Trains from Venice to the Cinque Terre, from the C.T. to Nice, and from Nice to Paris. Those were the longest distances for the whole group. We'll have a few short trips too, but those can be booked on the day of travel.

Car rentals for 8 of us after Paris.

Hotels or B&Bs for different size groups over the month-long trip.

A few tours in Venice - Doge's Palace and a walking tour/pub crawl. A walking tour in Aix-en-Provence. The rest of the tours or excursions we'll book along the way.

A catered dinner at our rental house in Nice.

Telephones and Wi-Fi - Everywhere we're staying has Wi-Fi available, and we each investigated our phone capabilities overseas. We all elected to use our U.S. cellphones, and our companies' overseas plans, rather than buying phone chips in Europe.

Because we were committed to some apartment and house rentals, train tickets and car rentals, some of us bought trip insurance. We all understood that we were expected to pay our share of those things, even if there was an emergency which required cancellation of our trip, or an early departure. The cost of the insurance was minimal, and worth it for the peace of mind. I used Travel Guard and felt that the coverage we got was a good value at around $200 each. The cost is based on your non-refundable expenses, so it would be more for a cruise or package tour, where you're essentially paying for the whole thing at once, and ahead of departure.

As far as budget, I've successfully estimated the cost of our trips several times over the years, and determined that for this trip on-the-ground expenses would be about $200 per day, per person. That includes everything, and I mean everything - accommodations, transportation, food, tours, entry to museums and attractions. Really everything but souvenirs. With that budget in mind, people could determine how long they'd like to stay.

Along the way, we'll take turns paying for meals or groceries, and then average the expenses at the end of the trip.  This worked well on our last group trip, and keeping an eye on total expenditures every few days helped determine whose turn it was to pay.

In our dreams we picture this a Disneyland-type experience - everything clean, pretty, tasty and easy to understand, but with cheaper wine! Follow along and see how it turns out!