Onward and Upward!

Four months have passed since I left my story at the port of Genoa. In January we went on another cruise, the third since we took this Italian cruise I have been telling you about. We have managed to fit in a few land trips in the USA too and have just returned from Houston, Texas, further delaying my return to remembering Italy.

We are about to embark on a long day trip from Genoa to Cinque Terre a famous tourist attraction of 5 small towns clinging to the mountainsides and almost tumbling into the sea. We will spend time on a bus, then a boat and then a train before getting back on a bus again for a long ride back to Genoa and our ship, the Emerald Princess.

Even though I am traveling on a fast moving bus (once we leave Genoa's early morning rush-hour as people drive to work) I take pictures out of the window using a little Canon pocket camera. I know it's shutter speed won't be fast enough to capture everything I suddenly see out of my tinted window but this may be the only time in my life that I will make this trip and I'm never going to remember it all, which is the whole reason for bringing a camera in the first place. Once off the bus I can use my big camera with it's choice of lenses.

We've already docked and eaten a modest American breakfast and are ready to climb aboard the bus and head up from the city into the mountains on our 90 minute journey.

I won't be able to identify any of these Italian towns as I am being driven along on a road I have never been on before. If I had been in a car and driving I would have seen the signs identifying each place but couldn't take photos. We are driving on a highway until we get to La Spezia so pulling over and stopping to take photos isn't an option.

As tourists in Italy we have a lot of world-famous sights to see but we are also interested in Everyday Italy where people are working and living and most importantly eating!

  I like the soft early morning light on this October morning

Passing over a picturesque valley

Lots of dead trees on this hillside

Glimpses of the sea

Rugged hilly terrain

We are told by our guide that we will soon be pulling off the highway at a rest stop where there will be, in order of importance; public toilets (hooray!) espresso (yes!) and snacks available for purchase.
Two other buses pull up for the same reasons once we have parked. Ours is closest to the camera.

While most of the other passengers on the 3 buses (roughly 140 people!) stream in to use the toilets I wait outside, smoking a cigarette. I'll go in when the rush subsides. We are stopping for 30 minutes.

When I eventually did go inside there was still a line to use the men's bathroom and an even longer one to use the women's. The bathrooms were big but designed for maybe 6 people at a time and the wait so long for the ladies that while I was at the urinal in the men's, several ladies walked in to use the vacant stalls. They apologized of course but I fully understood the urgency of their need.

Back outside a man drove up in this. A Ferrari! 

The temporary license tag hanging from the engine bay tells me it is a rental car. Nice! What fun it must be to drive this on those smooth Italian roads. (not practical on the bomb-crater streets of Chicago)

Before getting back on the bus I heard one American gentleman complain that there weren't enough bathrooms-they would have needed 140 of them to ensure no waiting! Patience is a virtue....

Next we drive on to La Spezia and the bus will slow down enough to get some decent photos. From there it is a short drive to Cinque Terre.