Hiking in Cinque Terre

Summary: In case you don't want to read everything, basically take Trail 6p to Trail 6d/7a to get from Manarola to Corniglia on a beautiful hike (3.2 km/2.0 mi). Then take a train or hike between to check out the other towns, especially Monterosso if you're interested in swimming at the beach.

We started by taking the train from florence to Manarola. After we wandered around a bit and checked out the town, we decided to do a bit of a hike. The blue trail (the one along the coast between the towns) was closed from Manarola to Corniglia. At first we were a little upset that we couldn't hike along the Mediterranean, but it ended up being a good thing because the inland trail we took was just as scenic and offered more diversity.

To get to the trail, you have to walk uphill a bit on the main (and pretty much only) road in Manarola. After the road starts curving to the left there'll be a set of steps with a signpost that says Volastra or Corniglia, can't remember which. I think it is also labeled as Trail 6p. You want the one that goes to the left towards the Mediterranean because it is much more scenic than the more inland path which is labeled as just Trail 6. We followed this path from Manarola to Volastra and then Volastra to Corniglia. Once we found the path, it wasn't far, only 1 km/0.6 mi to Volastra, but it is a very steep incline. Make sure to follow the signs on your way up for Volastra and Corniglia because there are a couple forks in the trail and some of them are just private farmer's paths.After lunch it was another 2.2 km/1.4 mi to Corniglia on Trail 6d/7a, with a lot of cool places to stop and take pictures.Once we got to Corniglia, we took a few pictures and then ran to the train station to catch a train to Vernazza (we had the Eurorail Pass, which made it free to ride). Of course you could hike between the rest of the towns also, but we were feeling lazy.At Vernazza be sure to check out the picturesque harbor. Unfortunately it rained for most of the hour we spent there so it wasn't as great as it could've been, hopefully the weather cooperates more for you.Finally, we took the train over to Monterosso and grabbed dinner before going swimming at the wonderful beach. We took the train back to Florence at around 6 PM after a wonderful, tiring day.