Vernazza to Monterosso and return

On Friday, September 12, we started slow trying to catch up on news (some terrible news today), Facebook posts, and Findpenguins. Then it was off hiking. Down to Vernazza with a climb to the watchtower through narrow walkways, then on the trail from Vernazza to Monterosso a distance of about 2.3 miles with an elevation gain of about 570 ft before descending steeply to Monterosso. We explored a bit, found a restaurant for tiramisu, aperol spritzer, and a lemon spritzer before reversing course to return to Vernazza where we bought a focaccia sandwich and a bottle of red wine for dinner at our airbnb, L'Eremo, which, of course, required a climb past the La Torre restaurant. While at L'Eremo we met Holly from Pullman, her daughter, Brin, from Enumclaw, Frank and Maryann from Dublin, and a couple from San Jose, and a couple from Perth, Australia. The owner is Marco, a retired defense lawyer, whose family has owned the property for 80 years. The maid is Ina from Ukraine, a very tall refugee who speaks very little besides Ukrainian. Our total hiking today was about 6.3 miles with about 1200 ft of elevation gain.Read more