Cinque Terre 2012!

This is the legendary tale of six uniquely talented people who once upon a time leave the land of the clouds to venture to the unknown pastures of a mystical place by the name of Cinque Terre. The town was fabled to be one of un refuted beauty, a place of five small towns off the coast of the Italian north west. A place where houses were painted in a variety of pastel colours and people from around the world shared moments of awe and wonderment with strangers they met along the trail that links the five towns.

It was a sleepy Wednesday morning in mid August when the six friends boarded the small blue coloured bus to await their train to their latest adventure. The bus journey was of little event and soon they were away on the train, giving each other wonderfully heart-warming nicknames such as 'Lector' 'Helen of Troy' and 'CreepHER' A story created in the mind of Ben aptly named 'two-crack, half beard, wet pants" transformed Ed and Rach into 'Daddy's Boy' and 'Mindy' referring to the more hilarious parts of Ed's new personality; this involving a confession to once eating a small child by the name of Mindy.  Arriving at their destination the group broke into two, staying in separate hostels and Lector, Daddy's Boy, Helen and 2crack headed up to the top of Riomaggoire. They were shown towards an amazingly clean hostel room containing a huge double bed and bunk bed, together with a separate bathroom containing a shower so small one has to sit in order to shower with any kind of ease.

The long train journey at an end and hostel rooms acquired, the troop headed to find the beaches of Riomaggorie. After taking a long dip in the ocean they decided that the night was to be made perfect by watching the sunset and standing in awe of the picturesque scene just outside the door of their hilltop retreat.... and of course some boxed wine and cheap beers. The next day was to be penned a day of extremes involving many an exhilarating experiment as well as many hours of hard pushed walking up and down the hillsides of the Cinque Terre trail. The walk from Riomaggoire was one of little event; lovers walk provoking a few memories and funny stories from all present but was soon over. After everyone had taken copious amount of photographs that would never fully give justice to the real life beauty of their surroundings the pushed forward.
 

They had arrived at their first new town 'Manarola' and after exploring the quaint little town they headed off once more to the next town of 'Corniglia.' After a short train trip, required due to the trail being closed the team walked towards signposts of the trail to continue their journey. After a seemingly short amount of time had passed they arrived at the fabled staircase that Hayley remembered only too well from the year before. There were many people on this part of the trail and all were in high spirits despite the ever looming and seemingly never ending steps twisted and winded above them.  The group spread into couples as they headed up the hillside of stairs, all seemed happy to be pushing forward on their adventure. 382 steps later, having stopped for a moment to take the standard 'Here's us next to a sign stating what we just achieved' photograph, they headed into Corniglia. After having an entertaining lunch involving the sharing of a bottle of beer and the passing of many sandwich ingredients they headed in the direction of adventure. Bound towards the seaside once again as they had heard a rumour that there was a rather good place to carelessly jump off the side of a 12 meter cliff into the beautifully blue ocean beneath their feet.  Heading down an innumerable amount of steps the troop found themselves looking down on a small cove with a slim beach, many small boats and a huge and looming cliff just a short swim away from the shore.

The boys began to enthuse about their planned feat and made a swift b-line for the slight row of rocks that took you out towards the cliff, now in clear view from where they stood. Having stripped almost immediately the boys, shortly followed by Meg and Rach headed toward the cliff, first quite sensibly surveying the sea around them. Hayley and Patrizia stood looking out at the sea like worried Nonnas as their friends disappeared for what seemed like an eternity before surfacing as small ant like flecks of colour on the rocks opposite. The four adventure seekers sat perched on the cliff side and, after posing for many photos seemed to have a discussion over who should jump first. By this time the worried nonnas on shore had began to shout haphazard advice and plees to turn back to their friends, drawing the attention of the small population of holiday makers and locals that were also enjoying the beautiful scene. It was at the moment when Ed jumped that the crowd became just as involved as the two left ashore were shouting cheerful "Bravo's" to Ed as he screamed with the adrenaline rush and swiftly began to direct the next jumper. After both Rach and Meg had jumped, much to the horror of spectator grannies Hayley and Patrizia who proclaimed "I know her sister, if anything happens to Rach Kat is going to literally kill me!" there was now just Ben left on the ledge. Having decided for no other reason than pure boy 'one up-man ship'  he dwindled on the edge of the cliff shouting his countdown before quickly stopping and starting is pre-jump ritual all over again.  After 5 minutes and with a rather primal scream Ben plummeted towards the water below. The adventure over, at least for the moment, they headed for the hill that would lead them to town; though not before awkwardly watching Ed taking a shower before he sheepishly called "I'll just meet you all up the top." So they continued, climbing back to the small town of Corniglia plastered with huge grins that just wouldn't seem to shake and headed to the trail that would lead them, hot and sweaty to the next town.

The road that trailed from Corniglia to Vernazza was rumoured to be more challenging than either of the last hikes, the group having been pre-warned were fully prepared for scaling hillsides and walking up a seemingly never ending set of stairs. They headed off, recent adventures keeping their brains fresh with excitement and lusting for more. Hayley had promised everybody that Vernazza was far superior in beauty and general wonderment than the other towns and as the team headed up and down the hillside on the way to their destination there were moments of hilarity to be had. With Meg inadvertently telling a middle aged woman who was passing by to "Fuck me drunk," and not long after embarrassing herself again by telling another unsuspecting stranger that they were in fact a "Cunt." (Learning to speak with an Australian accent has its hardships) Ben bought the hilarity full circle after stopping and excitedly pointing at an old crashed and broken down yellow truck. (How it got there nobody really knows!) proclaiming, much like an overly excitable child having gelato for the first time "It's called Benny!." As Vernazza came into view the group decided that it was indeed a rather magical town, even from afar and at the sighting of a small harbor the exploration once again began as the troop headed at a quick pace. Eventually turning into a fast jog all the way down the innumerable number of stairs of various shapes, sizes and colours and straight into the heart of Vernazza.

After announcing that she needed coffee Hayley and the girls headed to a nearby cafe whilst the boys, bursting at the thought, headed towards the water to see what they could jump off and photograph in this small and exceptional town. After quenching their thirst the girls headed to the harbor to find the boys scaling the rock face on the opposite side, after a while they headed to wash off in the showers constructed in a cave that connected to a church. Shortly after relieving his bladder, having not realised his holy surroundings Ed and Ben headed back to the harbour and the group once again headed toward new adventures. Taking a few token pictures of Vernazza all six headed off whilst singing songs and talking about a variety of subjects. At some point in time along this final journey somebody in the posse decided to go for a run along the path. This idea spiralled out of control and after a primal scream of "RUN!" they suddenly found themselves running, not really knowing why but persevering anyway towards the ever closer and final town of Cinque Terre; Monterosso. All six now found themselves in an impromptu dash that would rival the Hunger Games at the moment where the contestants are set free and the cornucopia stands looming between them. The weak or rather, the less willing of group members began to fall behind and after waiting temporarily Hayley and Patrizia found themselves left in the dust of the other four as they sped towards their final destination.

Upon arrival at Monterosso the more energetic of the troop, dripping with sweat and with Joker like smiles ran straight toward the beach and the promisingly satisfying ocean water that lay waiting for them.  They had managed to reach the town in an impressive 40 minutes instead of the estimated hour and a half and a rather long 15 minutes later Hayley was seen coming into view on the hillside above them. With excited waves and yells of "Helen" she joined the rest of her friends and celebrated the victory of completing the walk, after of course, downing an entire half a litre of ice cold bottled water. Around 10 minutes later the final member of the team Patrizia had arrived and as everyone collected their belongings they headed into the town to track down some fresh vegetables to go with their pre-planned pasta dinner.

Having returned to the hostel, showered and began to feel more human the four members staying on the top of the hill headed toward the girls hostel room to enjoy their final night in Cinque Terre. Meg and Rach had prepared, what can only be called, an excessive amount of pasta and having offered second helpings to all Meg had a dilemma. She didn't want to waste perfectly edible food purely because of the lack of available Tupper-wear and so she searched the kitchen in hope of a suitable container. Having found a bright pink carrier bag and with a dubious look around the room she began to pour the remaining spaghetti into the bag. With a huge giggle she tied a knot in the top of the bag and claimed that all would be thankful to her tomorrow when they were hungry on the train. Having polished off a box of white wine they all headed up to the hostel at the top of the hill and sat drinking on the terrace, reliving their experiences until all were far too tired to continue, knowing that they had to be up bright and early to start their long and arbitrary journey back to San Remo.

The following morning started with routine events and found the group sat awaiting their first train of the day with snacks and stories to share. After bumbling onto the train and boarding another everyone started to become increasingly hungry. The plastic bag was pulled out and offered around, there was just one problem, cutlery was in short supply, the only thing on offer being plastic spoons. It was a sight that is best left to the imagination that took up the next 10 minutes of their train journey. Meg started the feat of eating the pasta, without much success and to the pure disgust of two strangers sat opposite her on the train. As the epic mealtime continued jam (for the pasta obviously) peach halves and various pieces of fresh fruit were added to the mix. The looks of horror turned into wale's of laughter that possessed one of our new audience so much that he saw fit to repeatedly hit the window and small table dividing him from Meg whom he was now out rightly laughing at. The hilarity ensued as everyone finished their meals, much to the disgust of passersby and with many photographs taken in evidence the group left the train and made a mad dash to their headquarters in San Remo before taking one final journey up towards Bajardo on the famous ever honking bright blue bus. 

Just a small idea of the hilarity that ensued from eating cold spaghetti and jam out of a plastic bag with plastic spoons!