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By trainСССР — CC BY-SA 2.5 ca (Wikimedia Commons)

The Cinque Terre

Liguria, Italy · Italy

Five fishing villages wedged into eleven kilometres of Ligurian cliff, linked for centuries only by footpaths and by sea because there was no way to cut a road. Above them, seven thousand kilometres of dry-stone walls hold up vine terraces carved out by hand generation after generation. This trip IS DONE BY TRAIN: it is not a preference, it is that all five centres have restricted traffic, and the mountain road linking them is slow, with scarce and expensive parking at the entrance to each village.

3 days2 nights6 stopsBest season: April to June and September and October. The Cinque Terre Express runs roughly from mid-March to early November, so outside that window transport gets complicated. July and August are unbearable for crowds and for heat on the paths. And in winter several paths close for rockfall risk.

Before you go

THIS TRIP IS DONE BY TRAIN, and it is not optional.
ALL FIVE VILLAGES HAVE A ZTL: car access to the centres is reserved for residents, and the fine for entering improperly runs to hundreds of euros.
Leave the car in La Spezia or Levanto and move on the Cinque Terre Express, which links the five villages in minutes.
THE CARD: there are two, the Trekking Card, which gives access to the paid paths and the park buses (including the Corniglia shuttle), and the Treno MS Card, which also includes unlimited trains; if you will take the train twice and walk a paid path, the second is almost always worth it, because a single five-minute journey can cost up to ten euros on a high-tariff day.
THE PATHS: walking them in flip-flops or open sandals is forbidden, and there are checks.
And FILL UP BEFORE YOU ARRIVE: don't count on finding a petrol station in the villages.

Day 1The two southern villages Day 2The one up high and the one with the harbour Day 3The path that linked them

Day 1 · The two southern villages

Riomaggiore and Manarola · by train

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Riomaggiore

heritage

The first of the five coming from the south, with coloured houses stacked in a cleft between two slopes and running down to a tiny harbour where the boats are pulled out of the water and left beached in the street. Tradition has it that fishermen painted their house a different shade so they could pick it out from the sea.

Tip

The Via dell'Amore to Manarola starts here, fully reopened in 2025 after years of closure. Today it can only be walked in this direction, with a booked time slot and a separate ticket: book it before you go.

5 min to the next stop

Manarola

viewpoints

The most photographed of the five, and the photograph is taken from the Nessun Dorma viewpoint on the Punta Bonfiglio headland: the whole village falling to the water in coloured steps. Behind it climb the vineyard terraces where sciacchetrà is made, the sweet wine praised by the poet Eugenio Montale.

Tip

Across these five villages there are reckoned to be some seven thousand kilometres of dry-stone walls holding up the terraces, raised by hand over centuries. Look up, not only out to sea.

Day 2 · The one up high and the one with the harbour

Corniglia and Vernazza · by train

Corniglia

heritage

The only one of the five that does not touch the sea: it sits on top of a headland a hundred metres up, and from the station you climb the Lardarina, a stairway of three hundred and eighty-two steps in thirty-three flights. That is why it is the least visited and the one that best keeps the feel of a farming village rather than a fishing one.

Tip

There is a shuttle bus from the station if you do not fancy the steps, and it is included in the train card. And the Santa Maria viewpoint at the end of the village takes in all five coastal villages at once.

10 min to the next stop

Luca Casartelli — CC BY-SA 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Vernazza

history

The only one of the five with a natural harbour, which is why it is one of the oldest and the one that had a castle: the Doria tower watched the entrance from the 11th century to warn of Saracen pirates. In October 2011 a mudslide came down the ravine and buried the village up to four metres deep; there were victims in Vernazza and Monterosso, and it took years to rebuild.

Tip

The picture of Vernazza from above is taken ten minutes up the path towards Monterosso, not from the village. That stretch requires the park card.

Day 3 · The path that linked them

From Vernazza to Monterosso · 4 km on foot

Lee Coursey from Decatur, GA — CC BY 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

The Sentiero Azzurro to Monterosso

nature

The Vernazza to Monterosso stretch is nearly four kilometres along the cornice, between vine and olive terraces, and it takes no less than two hours: it climbs and drops continuously on stone steps. It is the best piece of the path that linked the five villages when there was neither road nor railway.

Tip

It requires the park card. And flip-flops or open sandals are forbidden: there are checks and it is not a recommendation, it is a rule. Carry water, because there are no fountains on this stretch.

Lee & Chantelle McArthur from SMiths, Bermuda — CC BY 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons)

Monterosso al Mare

culture

The largest and, with Vernazza, one of the oldest, split in two by a tunnel cut through the rock: on one side the medieval centre, on the other the newer Fegina quarter with the only large sandy beach of the five. Eugenio Montale spent his childhood summers here; he won the Nobel Prize in literature and wrote about these terraces.

Tip

Look for the statue of the Giant, a fourteen-metre reinforced-concrete Neptune made in 1910 to hold up a villa's terrace. It lost its trident and its arms in the wartime bombing and is still there, mutilated.

This getaway is in the app, day by day, with every stop on the map, the drives between them and where to sleep, and the option to save it for when there is no signal.

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