Fruits of the Sea

True to form our local church woke us up this morning at 7:00 AM with the ringing of the church bells (or more correctly, gonging of the bells). I sometimes wonder if the town took a vote and said, “Let’s let the church wake us up at 7:00. That is a good time for everyone.” I can’t understand what the hurry is—everyone here is over 70 and retired! There is really no need to awaken the entire town so early in my opinion. And as usual, there is a second church somewhere nearby, whose clock is slightly different than the first. So what we really hear at 7am is seven gongs and then a few seconds later, the alarm clock goes off with about 25 more! A few minutes later, you can just faintly hear the bells ringing from the next town!

Our goal today was to see another town and find an internet connection point. Our guide book said that town #5 Monterosso had a good internet site. Since we are going to visit all of the towns, we decided to try our luck with the last little town on the Cinque Terra.

FYI- the towns in order from North to South are: Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola (our town) and Riomaggiore. By the way, the way you say Cinque Terra is Chink-qua terra. Cinque means five like cinco in Spanish.

We got to Monterosso and were surprised at how large the town was compared to Manarola and Riomaggiore. It is actually divided into 2 parts: the old town and the new town. Since most of the interesting stuff is in the old town, we ventured there first.


We took the scenic path to the town-- about a 10 minute walk from the train station. We ventured on to an old WWII bunker. We wound our way around the water’s edge and found ourselves in the town square or the piazza. Upon entering the town square we found the town statue of Garibaldi who helped unite the people of Italy into a modern nation.


We then went to peek into the town church, the Church of St. John the Baptist. It was built in the 1300’s using Carrara marble from the nearby quarries. It too is in the black and white striped Romanesque style that we have seen in the past few churches. Next to the church is the Oratory of the Dead. OK--a little history here: During the Counter-Reformation the Catholic Church offset the influence of the Lutherans by creating brotherhoods of good works. Monterossa had two so-called “Rotary clubs”, nicknamed Black and White. The building now standing is the oratory of the Black group, whose mission was to arrange for funerals and take care of the widows, orphans, and the shipwrecked. The entire decorum is macabre. There are sculptures of skeletons everywhere. This membership has been passed down from father to son for generations.

We then looked for the Internet point only to discover that it was closed for the season (something we are finding more and more of. November must begin their vacation time as many shops are now closed until the spring). Having seen most of the town, we decided to catch the next milk-run train to Vernazza and check out their internet site.

We found our way to Vernazza via the train. It is like the other towns, building upon building, rolling down to the sea. We found our Wi-fi internet point and posted the past 2 days of blogs.


After that we walked down to the town square which sits right down at the sea. People were enjoying lunch on the sea wall and we enjoyed the view of Monterosso to the north.

We had lunch at a recommended restaurant and I had one of the local favorites; pansotti, which is spinach ravioli stuffed with cheese and covered in a walnut cream sauce. It was delicious. Jim had gnocchi with shrimp which I don’t think he liked as well as I liked mine.

After lunch we walked around a bit and then took the train to our town of Manarola.

Around 4:30 we went out to stroll, like the locals do. It is called “passeggiata” which means strolling lazily together up and down the main street! That is what we have found in all the smaller towns; Sorrento, Minori, and Manarola. Around 5:00 the locals come out of their homes and stroll up and down and back and forth. There are men together, women together, and couples together. Here in Manarola they stroll the Cinque Terra walk that hugs the mountain and looks back on their town.
So we did like they do and lazily strolled along! We got some beautiful sunset pictures.

For dinner we just wanted a salad and soup. We stopped back at the 1st restaurant we went to when we arrived in town and asked the owner lady if she had salads. “Yes” so we ordered 2. Then I asked if she had any soup. She got so excited and she said, “Yes, Fish Soup.” Well that wasn’t exactly what I had in mind but Jim said he would take a bowl and she looked at me and I said, “How about some Minestrone?” She said yes so that’s what we ordered. Our salads arrived and were delicious. The fresh vegetables were all thinly sliced.

Then came our soups! My little bowl of minestrone was just perfect. Jim on the other hand got a large platter of a rich broth and all sorts of Frutti di Mare (fruits of the sea). Of course none of this was peeled or cut up, just cooked seafood in the rich broth. He had shrimp (with the long antennae’s still attached), crabs, langoustine, clams, mussels, squid, calamari, octopus leg with the suckers still on, and anchovies (fresh anchovies are their specialty here on the Ligurian coast). I was amazed that there were so many different kinds of sea creatures on one plate. He could have charged a ticket price to see so many up close and personal, much like an aquarium!

Since we were the only ones in the restaurant, Jim took his time peeling and getting rid of the shells. I just sat there and watched in amazement. Of course we had no idea what price we were paying for this feast, but I told Jim he had to eat it since the other night we kind of just left the crabs on our plates. He ate it all, but it gave me a sympathy stomach ache!

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