John's Cinque Terra

John's  CINQUE TERRA !!!!!

I was debating whether to go on this trip for although I was feeling much better, the forecast for the sea crossing was rough, and I am not the best sailor at the best of times. However having braved the Manly ferry when the sea was rough coming through The Heads, better still having bounced from one wave top to the next on the Manly hydrofoil, I thought I could handle anything. I decided to go WHAT A GREAT DAY!

The day was just like spending a day on location for Game Of Thrones. The scenery and sites were breath taking. Our guide said that many Italian films had been made there. I think the pictures tell the story best. 

Up on these buildings, there is a plaque to commemorate the fact that Lord Byron ( the  English poet) swam from point A to point B because he was such a strong swimmer)

As my English teacher would have said, 

"This is a myth, a complete fabrication."

Or as our Italian guide who has lived there all her life pointedly remarked,

"Izza  bullshitta. But tourista like!"

In the last village (cinque terra is taken to mean five villages) is a little church run by a brotherhood who were both religious and to me had a wonderful sense of black humour. The island used to be a place for pirates as well as the law abiding population. To the brotherhood if you needed assistance, you got it. What really appealed to me, was that it didn't matter whether you were pirate or a saint (signified by having the sculptures of both on the same horizontal plane) you would all end  up dead anyway! (Signified by the skeletons around the church).

The return boat trip home was really rough. But there is nothing like being on a pitching and rolling boat filled with over excitable extremely demonstrative Italians to shake day up.

To summarise it was a terrific day out. A big bowl of pasta with a litre of not so rough red wine finished the day perfectly. .... You beauty!