Over the next several months, I am serializing my six-chapter travel memoir about a trip to Italy’s Cinque Terre in 2008* here. In 2010, I self-published Write Your Travel Memoirs: 5 Steps to Transform Your Travel Experiences Into Compelling Essays. It included five how-to chapters and, to provide an example, this memoir. The book is available on Amazon.com.

Meanwhile, I welcome your submissions to True Stories Well Told during my “travel memoir takeover.” Let’s fill that queue for after the series ends. See submission guidelines here.

Chapter 4 (continued). What to Do with Thirty Thousand Guests

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A sign states, “Torre Guardiola Nature Observation Point: 25 minute walk, refreshment point, naturalist library.” A narrow paved road leads gently downward, past signed plant communities: chapparal, maccia. The plants we’re passing are the same varieties we admired on yesterday’s hike; the giant cactuses, the flowering groundcovers. Nice, but we’re losing elevation with every step on this, our day of rest. This is definitely not the place of benches for resting and picnicking I had projected in my mind’s eye.

Down and more down. With each step a knot of fear tightens in my belly. It’s after 10:00 now and the sun is warming the air. We’re pasty Wisconsin winter refugees; we’re not used to the strength of the sun here. We’ll be stumbling back up this hill in the full heat of midday. I fear exhaustion, heat stroke. Aprehension causes me to pause often. Will what we see when we reach the Torre Guardiola be worth what we’ll pay? Can we afford it, on this, our day of recuperation?

This is not what I had imagined when I read the words “botanical garden.” But there it is again; the preconceptions that trips up the traveler. Why would I assume that here, in the land of double-gravity, there would be level terrain, and that precious resource would be used for a park?  Silly me.

But we have achieved our goal; in the land of thirty thousand day-trippers, we have found the place where no one is. Not a soul walks this sloping road but us.

Despite my growing dread of the return climb, we keep going. Several hairpins later, we arrive at the “refreshment point.”  (I love this about Italy.) We see our first people since exiting the bus—two young lovers trying to take a self-portrait. I offer to snap the picture. A few steps more and we meet the young guard of the Torre, who asks to see our tickets, our magic Cinque Terre passes. He sells us a beer and we chat. “Nevicava a Pasqua,”he says —It was snowing on Easter. “This week is the first sun.”

“Expecting crowds today?” We draw out the conversation, putting off going back up that mountain. “Not here, maybe. But in town, yes! Last year there were so many people on Liberation Day they had to close the Via dell’Amore to two-way traffic. Police say, one hour this way, then one hour that way. Maybe again today they do that.” This guard is clearly expecting a day of leisure at his post; he’s dressed in only very short cut-off jeans. Already brown as a nut, he’s working on adding a mahogany polish to his tan. He’s a sight made for chick-flicks, all muscled torso, smiling eyes, black curls. I later comment on his diamond-hard nipples to Jim, who looks startled to hear me say it.

A little family appears behind the guard’s shoulder—coming from a trail I hadn’t noticed. Greetings all round. “Where does that go?” I ask. “Riomaggiore. Piano.” Gentle.

There is a “gentle” trail that leads back to the town! We are saved from the long climb up to the main road! After a few more minutes conversing at the “refereshment point” we decide to move on. So much for the delights of the Torre Gardiola botanical garden.

In some places this trail to Riomaggiore is carved into stone, in others constructed from large timbers. After descending through shady woods, the route turns level and exposed as it curls around the underside of the cliff. For long stretches a roof of netting protects it (and us) from falling rocks. Sometimes the trail leaves the narrow shelf of rock and proceeds on boardwalks pinned to the vertical rock. This trail represents a kind of communal labor as difficult as the building of the terraces of Cinque Terre, but performed more recently. It is part of the national park scheme, adding to the miles of trails that draw the tourists here.

An easy half hour’s walk returns us to the harbor at Riomaggiore, where a  ferry is releasing a full load of passengers. A few steps more and we’re back at the lower plaza—and a mass of tourists is roiling around us, half arriving in Riomaggiore and the other half setting out for the trail or the ferry. They’re a rippling rainbow of bright windbreakers and day-packs.

We’re ready to look for a place for lunch. But first we spot a bookstore—more Dylan Dogs? Inside, a big man whose nasal voice could hail from Wisconsin is asking for information. “Where is the Sinky Terry?”

“Cinque Terre. You are there,” says the proprietor.

“But this is Rye-o Major. Where is Sinky Terry?”

Everyone in the crowded shop exchanges sympathetic glances. Jim and I share a glance loaded with superiority. We may be tourists, but we’re not him.

Minutes later, despite the crowds—to the day-trippers it is still early for lunch—we easily find seats in a café. Soon an order of pizza alla quatre stagione heads our way. Fresh beer bubbles in our glasses.

“I feel less negative here,” Jim says. “I’m less irritated by people.”

“Are you referring to Mr. Sinky Terry?”

“Yes, but not just that.”

I know what he means—I’m falling in love with this place, and like anyone in love, I’m  generous of spirit.

After lunch we return to the lower plaza. The tourist booth offers free Internet access, so I stop to check e-mail before we walk the Via dell’Amore back to Manarola.

It’s been roughly 48 hours since my last Internet check-in, as Manarola has no Internet cafe. There are no messages from my work colleagues—good. There is one message from Elaine and Dave. But it is brief and vague. “Weather here good, Fred misses you” —that’s all. I’m disappointed. I want an anecdote to take to Jim, something to reassure him that while we’re enjoying all this, Fred is not unhappy where he is. Did the house-sitters not understand that when I suggested they keep us posted, I was really begging for entertaining notes like a sentimental (and guilt-ridden) pet-owner?

It doesn’t take long for worry to recede, under the influence of the Cinque Terre’s charms. Besides, we have a more immediate concern: after tonight we will be homeless. Where will we find to park our suitcases and selves over the holiday weekend?

 On the Via the sun is warm and the traffic is elbow-to-elbow, a kaleidoscope of fancy couples in leather and fur, dog-walkers, families in bright sports jackets, young lovers in shirtsleeves—but we are all so visibly happy to be here, couples and families and lovers and dogs all part of the same festive parade, the crowd doesn’t bother us. Back at our room over Paulo’s ceramics store we sleep off the exertion, the pizza and beer, glad to have a hole in which to hide from the river of people. The clamor of voices outside our window could be the roar of a waterfall.

© 2024 Sarah White

*I self-published Write Your Travel Memoirs mainly as an experiment to test the print-on-demand workflow before offering it to my clients. I had the content, from workshops I had taught for Story Circle Network’s online classes, and enjoyed adapting it to book form.